Am I to move amendment No. 1, Sir?
Children Bill, 1940—Report Stage.
I move:—
In page 2, line 26, to add at the end of Section 3 (1) the following words: "and shall in respect of at least one such school to be situated in the County Borough of Dublin make provision for the medical examination and observation by qualified persons of every child brought before the Juveniles Court, in order that the district justice of such court shall have before him reports from the medical officer and qualified persons observing on the psychological and physical condition of every juvenile to be disposed of by him."
Does the Minister intend to accept this amendment?
I do not think so.
But he has an open mind?
Well, I want to hear what the Deputy has to say.
That gives me great courage. This is the furthest I have ever got, and I have been at it seven years. This is the ninth time I have returned to this issue. The proposal contained in this amendment is that we should establish in the City of Dublin a clinic run on lines not identical with but similar to clinics operated in London, Glasgow, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Denver, and in most of the big cities of the English-speaking world with which I am familiar, for a specific purpose, and the specific purpose is to separate the sick children from the truly delinquent children who come before the Juvenile Court.
Anyone who has interested himself in the subject of juvenile delinquency recognises that if you are dealing with the problem of the juvenile delinquent under 16 years of age, the hope of redeeming that child and making a good citizen out of him is very high, but when you find yourself confronted with a juvenile delinquent of 18, 19 or 20 years of age, the hope of redeeming that individual is comparatively low. Therefore, the aim of any prudent Government should be to secure that when a child under 16 years of age comes within the ambit of its authority for correction for some extra legal act, no pain should be spared to secure that the result of that correction will be that that child will never come in conflict with the law again. To do that, you have got to ensure that whatever correction is administered will be appropriate to the circumstances surrounding the delinquent act.
During the lifetime of the late District Justice Cussen, who for many years presided with distinction over the Juvenile Court in this city, I was privileged to sit on the bench with him, and no one who had that privilege could avoid being struck by the fact that a high proportion of the children who were brought in there were manifestly suffering from psychological or physical disability. Let us bear this in mind, and it cannot be too often repeated: we should not over-sentimentalise the problem of juvenile delinquency. Many people going into the Juvenile Court would get the idea that all the juveniles brought before the magistrate were poor injured little angels. Well, they are nothing of the kind. Amongst those children who are brought into the Juvenile Court there are some pretty tough eggs, and they have to be dealt with by the most effective method for dealing with a tough egg. It has to be borne in mind that no child is taken away from its parents and put into an institution by the Juvenile Court until he has been before the magistrate on substantially more than one occasion. Now, some children may keep coming before the magistrate because they are tough eggs, and require a discipline which they are not getting in their own homes, and, when the magistrate makes up his mind that he cannot persuade the parents of those children to administer the discipline that is necessary for their own salvation, it then becomes his duty to choose a suitable institution and to see that those children are sent there, so that they may have the discipline that will rescue them from themselves and convert them into decent, law-abiding citizens in their maturity.
Very frequently children come before the court and it would appear from their general conduct that they are manifesting initial criminal tendencies. But the trained observer would immediately detect in a child's demeanour and conduct evidence of some physical or psychological injury from which that child was suffering which was causing it to perpetrate delinquencies, although the child itself could not explain to authority why it was doing the things for which it was continually being brought before the police court. Not infrequently, on close and expert inquiry into the family surroundings of the child, it will emerge that the defect is not in the child at all, but that one of the parents, either through ignorance or psychological defect in himself or herself, is so handling the child that it is being driven to distraction and is manifesting that distraction by breaches of the law that society cannot tolerate and that must be ended.
If you take a child who is suffering from a psychological injury, or who is the victim of some psychological or possibly physical weakness in an overworked parent, and submit that child to discipline that would be salutary and good in the case of the normal little tough egg, instead of curing the child who is suffering from the psychological affliction you are going gravely to accentuate his psychological trouble, and you may inflict a scar upon his entire personality which will be concealed, and which will not manifest itself until that child turns up as a young man in the Borstal Institute and subsequently in Mountjoy Jail.
I put it to the Minister for Education that every child committed to his care by the Department of Justice, through the Juvenile Courts, is a trust from which he cannot escape. It is not enough for him to say: "I have visited the industrial school and I have visited the reformatory, and found them clean and well-run and generally satisfactory." He has to ask himself not only: "am I providing in the institutions to which these children may be sent, proper care for normal children" but he has to ask himself further: "Is the care that I am providing for each of these children adequate to rescue the child, for whom I have taken responsibility, from the dangers that beset it?"
Remember what the Minister undertakes to do. He is going into a Christian family and is talking out of the hands of the child's father and mother the authority that was vested in them by God to bring that child up. It may be that is a good thing in certain cases to do; it may be a necessary and proper thing to do; but if you do it, you take upon your shoulders a terrible responsibility. No Minister for Education is entitled simply to shovel a child into an industrial school and forget all about it. He is bound to satisfy himself that once having taken the responsibility for removing the child from the family circle, he will secure for it the best treatment that it is possible for the State to provide in order to compensate it for the loss of the natural family surroundings into which it was born under the dispensation of God. My suggestion is that without this institution that cannot be done.
I approached this question at least nine times, and when you do that you are sometimes a bit shy of repeating the same old arguments that you feel you have expounded so often before. But I have to cover the same ground because it is the same case, and I cannot get it listened to; I cannot get anyone to give a damn about it. The last time I spoke about it, no newspaper in Ireland considered it worth while mentioning, the reason being, apparently, that nobody gave a damn about it. The Minister just shovels them into an industrial school. Deputy Byrne and myself fought rings around on a previous occasion here, and nobody just gave a damn. The Minister even did not bother to rise in his place to comment upon what Deputy Byrne and I said. He merely rail-roaded the section through. I do not make any apologies for covering the same ground, and so long as I am in this House I will repeat my statements until a scandal—and it is a scandal—of this kind is abated.
I will put this case to Deputies. Suppose one of your children became unruly and intractable; suppose you administered the necessary correction, what you thought was proper correction for a serious fault, and the child persisted in it to the point when you felt that correction could effect no more. What would you do? Would you send for the Guards? Would you have the child taken to the police station and sent to Summerhill and thence to an industrial school? I do not think so. I think you would go to the family physician and say: "Doctor, I do not know what has come over this child at all. Punishment, remonstrance, lectures have no effect on him, and if he were not my own child I would say he was going to become a little criminal". The doctor probably would say: "There is nothing to worry about. There are two or three excellent children's consultants in Dublin. Bring the child to one of them and have him examined and you will find some psychological trouble or physical defect and, when it is corrected, the child will be restored to normalcy and he will be like any other kid, and you will have no more trouble with him than you had with any of the others."
Or he might say: "Let me see this child's mother before we determine what it is best to do." It may turn out that the child's mother was a nervous woman and was suffering from some trouble, and her short temper and nervous condition were reacting on the child, and the child did not understand that it was suffering from the effects of its mother's neurasthenia, and the mother would not understand it. But the net result would be that the little child would be so conducting itself that it had become the despair of its parents. By adopting proper measures you would put the mother in good health, you would help to eliminate the physical and psychological defects in the child and that little creature would be turned into a normal, happy child, to grow up into a useful normal citizen.
If that is the course that any one of us would adopt—and I cannot doubt that it is—why should we withhold from the poor what we stipulate our own children must have? I am not asking for a luxury; I am not asking that we should give Ford V8 cars to every resident of Gloucester Street; all I ask is that we should not impose on the children of the poor a system of reform designed to turn their children into criminals, when for our own children in similar cases we could secure, and would secure, treatment that would convert an unhappy, fractious child into a healthy kid, destined to grow into a useful citizen.
I do not want to appear to be lecturing Deputies. There is not a Deputy who has not as much expert knowledge in these matters as I have. There is not one of us but knows that if in your youth, in your extreme youth as a child, you are unsympathetically and imprudently handled in a time of childish mental crisis, you may carry into your manhood an injury which will render you abnormal for the length of your life. There are, many of us know, hundreds of men and women walking this world in misery, as a result of a psychological injury that was done to them when they were children, and the tragedy of it is that 99 per cent. of them do not know the reason of their eccentricities of maturity. But the skilled observer, whose duty it is to become learned in such matters, can watch them alienating their friends and become the "odd man out", simply because some foolish discipline was imposed on them when they were small children at a time when they wanted a cure, care or medical help, instead of the punishment they got.
The plan I have in mind is this. Some people may say here, why should we want a Juvenile Court at all? Because we are practical, sensible men. The poor very frequently are not in a position to get the kind of medical assistance out of their own pockets that the more well-to-do may provide. The children of the poor play in the streets and, for a variety of reasons, the deliquent child of the poor very frequently requires the intervention of the State to rescue it from what would otherwise be the consequences of what it may do. What I want to see happen is this. Under the new Children's Bill, the district justice will sit in his office like the head master of a school. That is as it should be. Say that a child has forced the Guards to proceed against it. Let us bear in mind that the Guards are, if anything, too softhearted. There is no question of the Guards going out like ravening lions to persecute the children of the poor. No child is brought before the juvenile court until the Guards have made up their minds that it is the best thing that can be done for the child's own good. A Guard in plain clothes tells the parents to have the child in court on a Friday morning in Dublin. The child is brought by the father or the mother or by both of them and the Guard in plain clothes, and usually a voluntary officer, into the district justice's room off the court. There, I anticipate, in a paternal domesticated kind of atmosphere, the justice will inquire into the circumstances that brought the child before the court.
Now comes the critical moment. Under the existing dispensation, the child is remanded to the filthy hole in Summerhill. When I say "filthy hole," I do not mean that it is crawling with vermin or covered with dirt. It is not; it is as clean as a new pin but it is a horrible old house with bars on the windows. A decent respectable man is doing his best to occupy the children with no means of occupying them. There is a miserable concrete yard at the back where the children are supposed to march up and down. There is no other place to accommodate them. Instead of sending the child to a place such as that, I want the district justice to be able to say to the parents of the child, "Well, now the best thing you can do is to bring him home and give him a ‘skelping' and let this not happen again. Let that be an end to it." The child is taken home by either the father or the mother and gets the "skelping" and that is the end of it. But, suppose the justice makes up his mind that either the parents are unsatisfactory, or that there is something about the case that makes him uneasy and that he wants another opportunity of considering the matter with the assistance of expert opinion, I want him to be in a position to say "I am going to send the child to the nuns at St. Teresa's Road" or wherever the place may be. He can say to the parents "You can see him there every day in the week. There will be a doctor and a matron there to look after him and the nuns will be there to keep their eye on him. Do not get distressed about him. If you like, you can go down to the home with him now or you can see him to-morrow evening or the evening after. My only purpose in sending him there is to have him examined so that when he comes up before me next Friday, I shall have before me the report of a physician on the state of his physical health and the report of a competent psychologist on the condition of his mind.
"When I have these facts before me, with the record of what he has been doing, I shall do my best for him, whatever that best may be. If the child is a sick child, then steps will be taken to provide better treatment for him. If the child is suffering from nervous strain or anything like that, perhaps the doctor will recommend that he be sent to an aunt in the country. "It might be as well for you to get away with him, too, for six months and try to become settled down. It may be that the report will show that the child is suffering from nervous strain, as a result of association with a neurasthenic person. Whatever we do, the decision will be taken after the best expert advice it is possible to get to save that child, so that when it leaves our hands it will have the best possible chance of turning over a new leaf and getting a new start." The cost of this proposal will be so microscopic that no tax can be conceived small enough to appropriate to this object.
It is unwise of the Deputy to imply that any public expenditure is involved. The Chair had some qualms about allowing the amendment to be moved.
I am prepared to say that the cost of this proposal will be nothing at all. Whether that is true or not, the Minister and I will not fall out about that detail, because if the cost be anything, it will be so small that a mind so large as that of the Minister will be unable to concentrate on it.
The Minister's view in this connection will, naturally, weigh with the Chair.
I am not asking for anything calculated to embarrass the Exchequer. I am not asking for a luxury for any section of the community. I am not asking for any concession. It seems to me that I am merely asking for bare justice for these children. If I have established that the alternative to my proposal is to run the danger of injuring these children permanently, that to withhold this precaution is to do the most defenceless section of the community, the children of the poor, grave injustice, I do not believe there is any Deputy sitting in the Dáil who wants to see that injustice done. For these reasons, for the ninth time, I ask for justice for these children. I ask no substantial sympathy from the people of whom I make the request, and I challenge any Deputy of this House or any interested party outside to make a case against the proposal that I have laid before Dáil Eireann, because there is no case to be made.
Deputy Dillon says that there is no case to be made against the proposal. The Deputy really has not given the House very much information. In putting up proposals in which the expenditure of public money is necessitated, particularly in times like the present, definite and adequate reasons must be given for such expenditure. In view of the emergency conditions prevailing, I feel that the House might have expected a more reasoned argument from Deputy Dillon, to show the advantages of this proposal. Even if I were in agreement with him, I do not think that I could accept the amendment in its present form, because what in fact has happened is that, by a skilful and ingenious piece of draftsmanship, we are discussing an amendment which certainly would involve Government expenditure.
We cannot expect a new development of the nature which the Deputy has in mind merely by conferring upon the Minister certain powers in a Bill of this kind to "make regulations accordingly." If I were to go to the schools to-morrow and ask them to provide a clinic—or whatever the place of observation and examination might be called, from the medical point of view —the schools would immediately retort that this is a matter which the Government themselves should undertake. They would say that with reason. Even, therefore, if we were agreed upon the principle of the amendment, it would be impossible to accept it in its present form.
Moreover, its terms render it impossible of implementation from another point of view. It presupposes that every single child who would be brought before a court would be examined. The interpretation, I think, could be put upon it, if this examination were to take place in an industrial school, that the managers of the schools were bound to accept the child. There is a very important question which Deputy Dillon and other speakers have not adverted to, so far as I know and that is that, under Section 52 of the Principal Act the managers of a certified school have full discretion as to whether they would accept or decline to receive such child. The amendment proposes that the Minister should make regulations which would compel acceptance, contrary to their statutory rights.
Surely the Minister is not serious in making a case of this kind?
I say that, in dealing with institutions like this, we have to be careful not to give the impression that we wish to override their legal rights.
The Minister could set up one of his own.
Mr. Byrne
Do not send them, in the first place.
If I may interrupt the Minister, may I say that surely it is possible for the Minister to set up one of his own for this special purpose? The remand home is not an institution: it is a place where the Minister has direct control, and if there is any question of management being interfered with, let him set up a remand home.
I do not wish the Deputy to be under the apprehension that I am not in favour of the principle of the amendment. As I indicated at the beginning, I have not a closed mind on the subject. I wish to make it clear to the House that, even if I did agree with the principle of the amendment—I recognise and feel sure that the Deputy does—it could not be dealt with under this amendment. I presume that he is simply taking advantage of this amendment to place his views on this matter before the House, to get some ventilation for his point of view, and to hear the arguments against it. I am not quite clear as to whether this is a proposal for medical examination of children or for psychological examination of children, or for both.
For both.
In any case, every child who is brought before the juvenile court would have to be examined. The question arises whether, if such a service is instituted, it would be under the Local Government Department, which is responsible for school inspection and which has, for example, in connection with the question of mental defectives, the responsibility for investigation and administration. If it is proposed that this should be allied to the courts and corollary to the work of the courts it seems to me that it would be a question for the Department of Justice, but I do not feel that Deputy Dillon has established the case which would justify him. I am interested, certainly, in the points he has made.
Is it the Minister's only argument that he does not know which Department would be concerned?
I am pointing out some of the difficulties. This Bill does not represent the three departments but only one Department.
Then the thing never can be done?
In any matter affecting other Departments, obviously consultation would be necessary and the views of the other Departments would be needed. In the space of three or four days I cannot, on the Report Stage of a measure of this kind, have had the consultation that would be necessary. I am simply stating my own point of view on the matter.
In his speech on the Committee Stage of the Bill, Deputy Dillon had not the satisfaction of receiving a reply from me. I did not see why I should make a reply. If any Deputy who claims to be a responsible person and gives an impression in the House that he has special knowledge of the subject and has taken a special interest in it, gets up here and makes statements affecting the institutions with which I have to deal, those statements should be very carefully examined.
Mr. Byrne
None of us ever said anything detrimental to the institutions.
Will the Deputy allow me to continue?
Mr. Byrne
It is not proper to say——
It is proper. I only wish to point out that, if Deputies wish the Minister for Education to go into a matter of this kind, the case that is put up to him should be put up in such a way that it will receive his sympathetic consideration.
That is a new doctrine. I hope that everything that I put up will not have to wait for sympathetic consideration.
The Deputy made a case that, while there is improved treatment of juvenile delinquents, many of them end up in the Borstal.
It is true.
He repeated the statement that many children had been shovelled into industrial schools without adequate inquiry.
It is true.
The Deputy may keep repeating "It is true" and may continue to interrupt me as long as he wishes, but he can represent only his own point of view. I happen, for the time being, to be responsible for the Department of Education and I have to take public responsibility, and if anybody tries to suggest in this House that injustice is being done to those children or that I am not undertaking my proper responsibility in seeing that they are not eventually on the road to becoming criminals, that they are not on the high road to the Borstal institutions, surely it is only in the nature of things that I should be permitted to reply to those charges. I was angry and annoyed with Deputy Dillon, but I must say that, since his speech got no support, with a single exception, from the remainder of the House, I did not think it worthy of consideration, and apparently the Irish newspapers, as a whole, did not consider it was worthy of very much consideration either. There is no foundation whatever for the suggestion, and it seems to me to imply definitely that there is something radically wrong in the present system. I admit that the present system was taken over from the British Government.
Twenty years ago.
But, like the national education system, it has had a valuable safeguard which, I think, is more valuable and greater than any system of clinic or anything that even modern science can put up. That is that we have these institutions and these children entrusted to our religious, our own people, our own flesh and blood, working under an Irish Government; and to suggest that, because of some weakness on my part, or some weakness in the people who run these institutions, we are neglecting our duty, and that if certain steps which Deputy Dillon has in mind were taken we would not have so many boys going from the industrial schools or the reformatory to the Borstal, is altogether wrong. No evidence whatever was given, and no figures were produced——
And you are too lazy to go and look for them.
I have the figures here, and I am going to read them, but it is not my business, when the Deputy makes baseless charges reflecting on the institutions operated by our religious in this country——
On a point of order, Sir.
I am not giving way, Sir.
Since the Deputy rises to a point of order, the Chair will hear him.
The Minister will have to give way to a point of order, and will have to conduct himself. Is it in order, Sir, for the Minister sedulously to misrepresent what has been said? He has now alleged that I reflected on the institutions operated by religious in this country. That statement is not true. Is it in order for the Minister to persist in repeating that statement when his attention has been directed to the fact that no such reflections have been made upon the institutions operated by religious in this country?
The Chair has had sad experience from all sides of this House of statements not being freely accepted and being interpreted in a manner that was objected to. It seems to me that the statement, made by the Minister and to which objection is taken, arose out of a series of interruptions, and interruptions often evoke sharp replies.
The specific point of order I raised was: Was it proper for the Minister to persist in the allegation that institutions operated by religious in this country had been represented as being unsatisfactory when, in fact, no such allegation was made?
The Chair did not hear any specific allegation. Interpretation of quotations from the Deputy's speech made on Committee Stage is quite another matter.
If the Minister did not make the statement, that is all right.
Here is what Deputy Dillon said on the last occasion. I am quoting from Column 1844, Volume 81:
"Mr. Dillon: That is what tries my patience, this unimaginative, blindalley outlook of the Minister responsible for education. What does he think is the ultimate end of the children who pass through his hands as juvenile delinquents? Does he lose interest in their future the moment they are shovelled into reformatories, or put into industrial schools? Does he ever sit down to ask himself when he is dealing with children of 11, 12 13 and 14, what is the effect of the treatment going to be on them when they are 21 or 22 years of age? Is not that his problem?"
Later on the Deputy continues:
"He gets up here and boasts of the fact that he has never done that, and that it is unfair to ask him to do that."
No, no. Do not cut out the middle of it. Read the whole thing.
The debate continued as follows:—
"Mr. Derrig: Is the Deputy entitled to misinterpret my remarks? I have made no such statement as the Deputy suggests. I simply stated that I am not responsible for the Borstal institution."
On a point of order, Sir. That is grossly dishonest. The Minister purports to read what I said, and without clearly indicating that he left out a long paragraph in the report, he continues to read. That is not honest.
An indication by Minister or Deputy that a quotation is selective, not continuous, should be given.
I said "he continued later on."
Now you are made admit it.
The debate continues:
"I have never said that it was not my duty to look after the reformatories and to take an interest in them.
"Mr. Dillon: Who said so?
"Mr. Derrig: The Deputy said that I got up and boasted that I had no responsibility for the children. If the Deputy wants that kind of thing he can have it.
"Mr. Dillon: I say if the Minister says he has no responsibility for the Borstal and objects to references to it, that suggests that he does not realise how vital an interest of the Minister for Education in the Borstal ought to be, because the whole burden of my complaint is that by the imprudent treatment of juvenile delinquents, many of them end up in the Borstal.
"Mr. Derrig: It does not suggest any such thing.
"Mr. Dillon: I say that if one goes to the Borstal and asks those in authority to produce the history of the boys there, one will be told that many of them are boys who were shovelled into industrial schools without adequate inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the delinquency for which they were put into these schools, and that if he had a clinic in which children could be segregated on the occasion of a first delinquency, and then properly treated, they would never be in the Borstal. They are in the Borstal because no premises were provided in which these could be looked after when there was still time to look after them."
Hear, hear. Where is the reflection on religious institutions there?
According to Deputy Dillon, whoever is to blame, under the present system boys are finding their way from the industrial schools and reformatories into the Borstal.
And do you not know that is true?
The Deputy has given the impression that a very serious situation existed in that regard.
I did not.
And, without saying so, he certainly gave the impression to those who are interested in the welfare of these young people that it was a very serious matter indeed. I have no wish whatever to put an unfair interpretation upon what the Deputy said, but his harangue certainly would give any independent person the idea that there was a stream of people going from the industrial schools and the reformatory into the Borstal institution.
That is a monstrous perversion and an irresponsible perversion.
There is no quotation to back it.
There is no quotation to back it, because the Minister has none, and he twists, and twists again, whatever quotations he does give.
The Deputy's words were: "They were shovelled into industrial schools without adequate inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the delinquency for which they were put into these schools."
And that is true.
And the Deputy said also that a great many of these young people become criminals and end up in the Borstal—a great many of them become criminals and end up in the Borstal.
Quote the words I used, and give the context.
Those are the words the Deputy used. The position is that some years ago we had a commission which dealt with this whole matter. Incidentally, I may mention that Mr. Cussen, to whom the Deputy has referred, was chairman of that commission. The Deputy says that anybody who visited the courts during Mr. Cussen's time must have been impressed with the fact that this clinic was necessary. It is rather strange, if that is so, that in spite of the fact that the matter was adverted to by the commission during the course of their inquiries, Mr. Cussen, who certainly had an excellent experience of the matter, and for that reason was made chairman of the commission, made no recommendation whatever in regard to it.
Have you got that report?
I wish to say, however, that at the present time, taking the figures that were given, when this commission sat, by the manager of the Borstal, between 1929 and 1934, the total number of boys discharged from industrial schools was 2,423 and, from the reformatory, 133.
On a point of order. What proportion of these discharges were delinquent children? Do not try to put a dirty fraud across on the House.
The Deputy has said repeatedly in this House that a great many of these children ended up as criminals and went to the Borstal.
Answer the question.
The Minister must be allowed to speak without interruption.
Before the Cussen Commission the manager of the Borstal explained that the total number of boys from industrial schools committed to that institution in the five years I have mentioned was 15, an average of three per year. As regards former reformatory schoolboys, only two were committed to the Borstal in the same period, the offence for which one was committed being, escaping from the reformatory. The Deputy may say whatever he wishes, but I think those figures must be convincing.
They are a shamelessly dishonest perversion of the figures.
The Deputy was making the charge, so serious with regard to the present juvenile offenders, that through some failure to take proper steps on my part or by some one else responsible for the system, a great many young people became criminals and ended up in the Borstal.
Does the Minister adhere to the shameless perversion of the figures?
It is true that the Cussen Commission recommended that arrangements be made for the medical examination of each child prior to an order being made for committal to an industrial school.
A minute ago the Minister said it did not.
That recommendation was carefully considered, and it was felt that a medical report of the nature suggested would not be of great value. In coming to that decision we had in mind that, at present, every child committed to an industrial school is examined by the school medical officer on admission, and if he reports that for any reason the child is not suitable for industrial school training, and if the report of the local medical officer is confirmed by the Department's medical inspector, the child is immediately released. Children in industrial schools and reformatories are also examined individually, where it is found necessary, by the Department's medical inspector, and suitable treatment is provided for them.
Mr. Byrne
Is there a medical examination for T.B.? I have in mind a case of a youngster at present in one school.
The Minister is in possession.
That is the kind of thing which makes one inclined to ask for the protection of the Chair.
Mr. Byrne
The Minister would want a good deal of protection there.
As to the case of poor people who have children in these schools, the Deputy brought a case under my notice and the child was examined on three separate occasions. He was examined before he left Glencree Reformatory and then examined at Dangean. We called the attention of our medical inspector to him, with the result that she went there specially to examine the child. Although she felt that there was then no evidence of disease, in order to make quite sure she had the child removed for X-ray treatment to the local hospital, and satisfied herself that detention could continue.
Mr. Byrne
Three years in Peamount Sanatorium.
I do not know if it is the same case about which the Deputy wrote me, but I took the necessary steps, and that is the position. Every thing that we can possibly do within reason to look after these children is done. In addition to that, so far as poor people generally are concerned, Deputy Dillon suggested in some way that the poor children are being deprived of medical facilities at present. The Deputy must be aware that there is a school medical service, that there are nurses and doctors visiting the schools, that cards are sent to parents where the doctors consider it necessary to call attention to the state of the children's health, that these children are brought back again for reexamination, and frequently, if there is evidence of disease and need for treatment, they are brought to a clinic and looked after by the medical officer of Dublin City. In addition, there are dispensary and other facilities under local authorities such as the tuberculosis scheme. I cannot see, from the strictly medical point of view, how parents have not ample facilities at present to interview doctors, even if they are poor. I cannot see where they are deprived of facilities to get adequate information as to the state of health of their children.
If we take up the attitude that this is not a medical but psychological question, and that what is needed is an examination of children in clinics, by some expert person with an understanding of children, who will be able to advise the best curative treatment, I do not know that a case for the appointment of such a psychologist was fully made. Some 90 per cent. of the children sent to industrial schools are committed on the ground of destitution. In these cases it is difficult to say how such conduct, health or character has any bearing on committal. A child might be defective physically or otherwise, but that does not seem to arise in connection with the committal of a child, on the ground of destitution, to an industrial school, unless it is suggested that all these children should be submitted to psychological examination. I think when it is realised that 90 per cent. of these children are committed on the ground of destitution, and that of the other 10 per cent. half are committed for failure to attend school and other offences, such as theft, it is difficult to see how ordinary sensible people, such as those responsible for the administration of the law with regard to juveniles, are not in a position quite amply to make up their minds with the information at their disposal as to what should be done with these children.
The district justice consults the probation officers, and through these officers he gets a fairly complete report of the home conditions of juveniles. The probation officer, judging by the reports received, maintains connection with these young delinquents, and, as Deputy Dillon admitted on the last stage of the Bill, it is only when juveniles are again and again brought under notice, that the justice takes the serious step of committing them. The Children's Court at present is not the same as the former children's court. Now it simply means that the district justice sits down and has a friendly conversation or, if you will, conference with the parents. The parents, the probation officer, and the representatives of any other organisation that the justice may think it well to consult, discuss the best steps to be taken to safeguard the future of the child. One would imagine that there is nothing whatever to be said for that system. If that is the position, as I understand it is, in the Children's Courts at present, then the parents, the public, and the House have ample and sufficient safeguards already, because every possible aspect of a case is brought under notice.
Does the Deputy contend that, when the parents are there, the justice does not discuss the question with the parents and hear their side of the case? I must again emphasise that we are not talking about justices appointed by a foreign Government. We are talking about justices who are just as much or more interested in the welfare of these children as those who talk a great deal more about them. The justice may put the child on probation; he may not feel that the offence is sufficiently serious to send the child to a reformatory or an industrial school. He may not feel, however, that the home conditions are entirely satisfactory and he may decide to place the child under the care of a probation officer. I think that that recent development is a considerable improvement on the scheme of things so far as the treatment of juvenile delinquents is concerned.
The probation officer may not be a psychologist, the justice may not be a psychologist; but they are ordinary common-sense people accustomed to dealing with this problem from day to day. They have the advantage of being able to call on social and religious organisations for further information where necessary. Some of these religious organisations, as a matter of fact, have taken it on themselves to carry out certain duties and, as is well known, there is a special organisation in Dublin for looking after young people generally. The justice, therefore, has these varied interests, all of whom are interested in the problem, to consult. He can also consult the clergy of the parish. Is it suggested that the district justice is so lacking, or that so little interest is taken in the problem of the child's future by all these people concerned, that a reasonable and fair decision will not be given? One would imagine that there was some sinister influence working in the administration to put children into industrial schools without reason. Anybody who wishes to understand what the real background is should go down to the Children's Court and see what actually happens.
Have you been there?
I have not been there, but I intend to go there. If I have not been there, I have had the advantage of discussing it with the justices. I understand that the court sits on Friday morning and very often I am not free to go on a Friday morning.
The Front Bench is always full on a Friday morning.
I have had the advantage of discussing the matter with the justices who are responsible for the courts, both in conversation and through written memoranda. Deputy Dillon spoke of the very serious responsibility that rests on my shoulders. He almosts made the welkin ring telling the House the fearful responsibility that rested on my shoulders for taking those children out of the control of the parents. That has to be done in process of law, as I have explained, and I have really nothing to do with it. What happens frequently is that after the child has been committed some Deputy comes to me and asks that the child should be released.
If there is a reasonable case, if the district justice, who is just as anxious as I am to have children released, feels there is a sound case, that the home conditions which may have been unsatisfactory are now satisfactory, or, in the case of an older boy, that employment is available, if we are satisfied that the boy can be released without danger we do it. If we do not choose to release the boy, it is for very good reasons. It is because we have reports from the police and the probation officer as to the circumstances. Deputies who come to us with stories of children being wrongfully detained forget that they have only heard one side of the case as a rule; they have only heard the case from the child's parents. They have not had the advantage of having had a report on the home conditions; they have not had the advantage of knowing what the career of the child has been up to that time.
Take cases of petty thefts on the part of children. Are these due to some psychological weakness? Are they not due in the main to lack of parental control, lack of discipline in the home? The vast majority of these cases where children are committed for actual offences under the code, I venture to suggest, arise through some lack in the home conditions and, arising out of that, a manifest lack of parental discipline. Thefts are committed in order to get money to attend picture-houses or for similar purposes. I submit that no psychological examination is necessary: that any ordinary jury of citizens would reach the conclusion that the proper cure for such children, if the home conditions are definitely unsuitable and the children cannot be sent back home, is to take them away from that environment for a period of time, and we would all like the period to be as short as possible.
Do you realise what date you are speaking of—1941?
It is really painful to hear the case made here that there is some psychological disease or other in the City of Dublin, just because clinics have been established in Chicago or Detroit, or some other city. Where is the comparison between conditions in the Catholic City of Dublin and in the City of Chicago? There is no comparison. I am quite sure that justices will scout the idea that there should be a medical and psychological examination of every child brought before them, but if justices in particular cases feel that they should have some medical report, that they would like to have the benefit of medical advice, I feel certain that that is a matter which the Department of Justice would consider.
Can they get it?
On the other hand, if it is a question of advising the parents, I feel confident that under the present system there can be no lack of good advice for the parents, if they are only prepared to take the advice. The trouble is that, although they get the advice over and over again from priests, from officers of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, from probation officers, and, in the end, from the district justice, they are not prepared to take the advice. In all these matters we must have co-operation, and if we cannot get co-operation from the parents of the children we will not get any further. Therefore, whatever case there may be, I do not think Deputy Dillon has established one for giving the district justice facilities to enable him to get further medical reports on the children who come before him. I feel that, on the psychological side, no real case has been made, and there is no necessity in Dublin for a clinic of this kind. I also feel that a comparison with other countries does not bring us anywhere. We would require to have a complete examination of our own conditions, and a case based on a close analysis of these conditions.
There may be a small number of boys convicted of a certain type of crime, and I do not think it should be beyond our power, if it be thought well in these and other cases, to provide the district justice with a special kind of knowledge. I know that when boys, even those convicted of vicious offences, are sent to reformatories they are treated with the greatest consideration. The whole effort and object of the boys' reformatory is to approach the rebuilding of a boy's character, and to place his feet upon the proper path from a religious point of view. That task is being approached in a definitely Christian way. I think that, from treatment of that kind, more valuable results can be obtained, and are being obtained in all these institutions, than could be obtained from having a psychological clinic.
When Deputy Dillon put up his case for this the last day the Minister kept silent. I am expressing my serious opinion when I say that I am sorry the Minister did not adopt the same attitude to-day. It would be much more in keeping with the seriousness of the subject than the revelation he has just given of his attitude on this matter, and of the way he treats arguments that are seriously put up in this House by Deputies. If he had kept silent, his own reputation and the reputation of the institutions that he is pretending to defend, would be in a much better position. I cannot now deal adequately with his gross misrepresentation of the case made by Deputy Dillon both to-day and the last day. It should have been apparent to the Minister, even if his attention had not been repeatedly called to it by way of interruption, that Deputy Dillon was dealing with one class of case and one only, the case of delinquents.
Dealing with delinquents, is it not, if not intentional, at least an effective effort to mislead the House to quote figures for all committals to industrial schools; to quote the figure of over 2,000 spread over a number of years, and to suggest that that had anything to do with the case that was made by Deputy Dillon? I cannot say that it was a deliberate attempt to mislead the House, but, so far as the Minister could do it, it was an effective attempt to mislead the House. What did we learn afterwards in an entirely different context? That 90 per cent. of the figures quoted by the Minister had nothing to do with the case; that 90 per cent. of the figures, according to the Minister himself, dealt with committals to industrial schools on the ground of destitution. Therefore, they had nothing to do with the case of delinquents.
Does not the amendment itself suggest that every child brought before the court be submitted to medical examination?
We have here a clear example of the complete irresponsibility with which this problem has been faced by the Minister. The case made was in connection with delinquents, and the Minister ignores it. He did so until attention was fixed on it by way of interruption. Surely, it must have penetrated the mind of the Minister that Deputy Dillon's whole case was to deal with one particular class—delinquents. I would say so far as delinquents are concerned, that there would be no difficulty even about the number of these. Did the Minister try to say that there are not a number of cases in which it would be a help to the district justice to have medical opinion, and in which he cannot get it? The Minister, when asked could the district justice get it at present, did not return an answer. I will give the Minister an opportunity of saying so now. Has the district justice power, at the present moment, to call for a medical or a mental examination of the child before him?
I do not know.
And yet the Minister stated to this House that the district justice could. Is that a serious way to face up to a problem of this kind? The Minister does not know. Why not give the district justice that power? If the Minister thinks it advisable that the district justice should have this power, why not give it to him? The Minister says that the district justice is not a medical man, that he is not a mental expert and not a psychological expert. Let us for the moment leave aside the psychological expert and confine ourselves to the question of the medical and mental expert. The district justice is not either. There is no reason why he should be, but give him the power to get the opinion of a man of that kind at least in cases in which he is doubtful.
The Minister tries to ride off on the Catholic ticket, but it will not do. It is a bit too cheap. It is dragging Catholicism a bit in the mud to bring it in in defence of the attitude which the Minister is now taking up. It was that portion of the Minister's speech that offended me most. Does the Minister pretend that because this is a Catholic city, there is no mental trouble among young children? Is that his contention? If it is not, his whole case in reference to Catholicism and the city falls to the ground. There are a number of children who commit crimes because they have not got proper medical treatment. I do not suggest, and neither did Deputy Dillon, that every crime of which a young delinquent is guilty is due to the lack of proper medical treatment, but there may be a number of crimes due to that. If so, is it not worth while, even with the present stringency of money, making an effort to save those children? You cannot blame the industrial schools, if you hand over to them to be dealt with by their particular methods children who should be dealt with by medical methods. That is what you are doing. There is no use pretending that there has been any attack on industrial schools or on their methods for dealing with normal cases, but how do you expect them to deal with cases that are abnormal, and that cannot possibly yield to the particular treatment which they are so well fitted to give?
It is easy for the Minister to say that they are not bound to take anybody, but if they refuse, the Minister is then up against the problem of finding some place of detention for those children. He started off with the excuse that industrial schools are perfectly free to refuse to take certain children, but if they do the Minister himself is faced with the problem of finding a place of detention for them. Hence his own argument falls to the ground. Could anybody who listened to the Minister's speech know what his attitude on this question was—I mean his own personal attitude as Minister for Education? Could anybody say whether he is in favour of medical inspection or not? An unwary person, listening to certain portions of his speech, might think that he was in favour of the principle of the amendment if certain difficulties could be got over. A great portion of his speech was directed to throwing cold water on the whole business, to suggesting that it was entirely unnecessary and that no case had been made. I put it that an excellent case was made, but even if the case had never been made, from the initial attitude taken up by the Minister, that he had an open mind on this important matter, he should have made the investigations. It is primarily his responsibility, and he cannot shelve that responsibility by pretending that a private Deputy has not made a case—and misrepresenting him, because he did make a case. His own responsibility is a serious one, even if the case had never been made, but apparently all he thinks it is necessary to do is to give a display of bad temper and to make petty debating points in a serious matter like this. That is simply shocking and he has not faced the problem.
He has an open mind on the matter. What is the result of that openness of mind, except not to keep anything in it so far as the children are concerned? What is he prepared to do? That question has been asked, and we have not the slightest indication from the Minister of the line he intends to take, or whether he intends, in the case of the children who may require this medical examination, to take any step to approach a solution. Imagine bringing forward as an excuse here that these children are not to get the necessary mental examination because it would cost money to the State! Imagine that excuse being made by the man who finished up with a pean of Christianity and Catholicity! It is almost incredible that a thing of the kind could happen. At a time when we are shovelling out money by the million, a couple of thousand pounds cannot be saved for this important work. I do not mind how many children—whether it be ten, 20 or 30—have to be dealt with. Their salvation is much more important, and money could be much more justifiably spent on it than on any of the plans and undertakings upon which it is at present being spent.
Then we have the old excuse that one Government Department does not know what another Government Department is doing, that they shut themselves up in hermetically-sealed boxes and apparently never consult each other. It is not the first time we had an example of that in this House, but it is certainly no excuse. The Minister does not shelve any of his own responsibility by trying to throw it over on to the shoulders of somebody else, especially if he does not give evidence that he has even consulted the Ministers or the heads of other Departments. The way in which the Minister approached this matter is really appalling, and I was surprised that he took up the line he did. I was surprised that he gave a quotation from Deputy Dillon without indicating that there was a lacuna in the quotation. I was still more surprised that, in spite of repeated interruptions, he, unintentionally, I have no doubt, quoted figures that were bound to mislead the House in regard to Deputy Dillon's intentions. He would not listen when an attempt was made to set him straight.
Leaving aside the case of the Minister, his hurt feelings, and his misrepresentation of Deputy Dillon, there is a much more important point involved, that is the fate of these children and their proper care. To be fair both to the children and to the industrial schools, it would be well if the Minister and his colleagues tackled this problem a great deal more seriously than he showed any evidence of doing in his speech in answer to the amendment. He said there was an attack on the House of Detention. There was not. Deputy Dillon pointed out that it was cleanly kept, and that the two people responsible there were doing their work as well as they could. But why is there not a proper playground there? On account of the rules of the House, we cannot move an amendment to that effect at this stage, and the Ceann Comhairle has kindly told me that the amendment down in my name, asking that power be given to the Minister to acquire land for that purpose, is out of order, but if we deal with the unsatisfactory condition of a place like Summerhill, we are not criticising the people who manage it.
We are criticising the facilities at the disposal of the people who manage it, and though I cannot argue the question of providing a satisfactory playground because I am a private Deputy, and cannot move an amendment to that effect, the Minister who is responsible might, in another place, be able to introduce an amendment giving himself power at least to provide a playground for the children there during their period of detention, until the court makes up its mind as to how these children should be dealt with. That is a reasonable request, and at a time when we are shovelling out money, as I said, it will not break the Exchequer.
There was a time when the Government went in for economy. It was the only occasion on which I ever saw any evidence that the present Government were going in for economy in anything except useful things. Here was a case made by the Minister on the expense involved in the present national crisis. The present national crisis is responsible for many things, but up to the present I have not seen that it has been responsible for any economies so far as the Government are concerned. It is responsible for many economies elsewhere, but not in Government circles, and the only time when that plea is continually thrown in our teeth is when we have a case like this in respect of the proper care of these unfortunate children.
I am not at all satisfied that youthful delinquency is properly dealt with. Firstly, I think that grown-up people have a completely wrong outlook on young people's so-called delinquencies in many cases. There may be "tough eggs", as Deputy Dillon mentioned. I never had the problem of tackling a "real tough egg", so I do not know how to deal with such a case, but still there are "tough eggs". There are children who are vicious, and how to deal with them is a very complicated matter, but when I hear grown-up people speak, I often wonder how they ever grew up, because they apparently were never children. They call crimes in children what are really instances of impishness in many ways. I have heard serious grown-up people saying what a terrible future is before these young children guilty of these so-called crimes, and one would think that the whole future of these children was at stake. If we look back to our own childhood, how many members of this House might not have run the risk of being sent into an industrial school for something they did in their childhood?
The whole thing is treated wrongly, and instead of additional children being sent into these institutions, I think fewer children should be sent in, and that another kind of care should be given them, and especially should care be taken, if they are mentally unfit children, that they will get the proper kind of treatment. The unfortunate industrial schools should not be saddled with the impossible task of giving mental treatment which they do not profess to be competent to give. The Minister goes off into all sorts of by-ways and, after listening to his speech, which was meant to be largely abusive and partially informative, we do not know whether or not he is going to take any steps to deal with this matter.
Mr. Byrne
In his opening remarks, Mr. Dillon made an earnest appeal that people should not get sentimental on this question of the treatment of children. I think that he had in mind that I might have gone a little bit too far on the last occasion when I spoke of the treatment of children. The children I had in mind were those who were taken from their parents because they had not been attending school. I have found that the school-attendance officers have discovered a remedy in some of these cases. Barefooted children were being brought to the courts for not attending school. It is true that they had remained away from school for a long time. An ordinary school-attendance officer with very small wages went to a shop and purchased a pair of boots and stockings for one of these children. That was the remedy. The mother sent the child to school as soon as the boots and stockings were forthcoming. Without the boots and stockings, the mother would not risk sending the child to school. If that had continued the child would, eventually, have found itself in an industrial school. It would have been thought by the district justice—properly, I suppose—that the mother could not provide boots and stockings for the child and that there were places for the reception of such children.
A large number of children could be saved from the industrial schools if the suggestion of Deputy Dillon were put into operation. I have mentioned the words "industrial schools" and I should like to avail of this opportunity to join in the protest of other Deputies against the deliberate misinterpretation by the Minister of Deputy Dillon's statements regarding these schools. Neither Deputy Dillon nor I, nor, indeed, anybody else, said an unkind word about the treatment of children by these schools. We did say that some children would be better at home with their parents. I have seen, in various parts of America, and in Glasgow, these clinics at work. Those in charge of them told me that, after a month's voluntary attendance—the parent bringing the child and leaving it there for a few hours each day and the child being watched closely by mental experts, physicians and teachers—the child was sent home and was never heard of afterwards either in court or in the clinic. I join in Deputy Dillon's appeal to the Minister. The Minister said that the Bill was framed, 20 years ago, by another Government. It was thought a proper Bill at the time. Now is the time to amend it. I do not think that a penny would be involved in carrying out the suggestion made. The district justice, the school-attendance officer or the plain-clothes Guard could get the child examined. The Reverend Mother in charge of one of these institutions could be asked to take the child for a month and report as to how it was going on, instead of bringing it before a district justice and having it sent to an industrial school for five years.
In many cases the hearts of parents are being broken. Dublin T.D.'s are aware of the number of parents who come to them. As the Minister said, we probably get only one side of the story but, if we had a clinic, we could ask for the other side of the story. The Minister said that children are medically examined but they are not medically examined until after they are sentenced. It is when they go to the industrial school that they are examined by the medical officer to the school. The child has then no chance of getting back to his parents. I feel nervous about addressing the House on this question when I think of some of the cases which have been brought to my notice. I may mention one case of which I heard. A certain lady who was in public life and who has since passed away took an interest in the welfare of children. She went to the courts and had an interview with some of the authorities there. I cannot mention the name but the reply made to that lady was "You know these schools have to be maintained." Is that a proper spirit—that you should snatch children from their parents so that a school, which has a couple of hundred "empties," should be maintained? These institutions should be maintained at the expense of the State. They should get their proper grants for making available accommodation for suitable children but it is not right to take a doubtful case from the charge of the parent and put it in one of these institutions because the institution has to be maintained.
The Deputy is quite right in what he has mentioned.
The Minister said that the last time we were discussing this Bill.
He ought to be chased out of public life.
Mr. Byrne
I could get sentimental about these cases because, during my residence in Dawson Street, parents from Dublin and outside came to me and asked me to state their case to the Minister so that their children would be sent home to them. I advise the Minister to get his officials to write to Glasgow and get the opinions of the authorities in charge of the clinic there. The Minister referred to Catholicity and used it as a sort of cover but, in Glasgow, I found a body of nuns—a Catholic organisation—in charge of the children and I was told that 50 per cent. of the children are sent home after a few days. The mother brings the child to an ordinary private house in a park where there is a room full of a certain type of toys. In another room, there are educational exhibits and in another room there are mechanical toys for boys. Experts go round and visit the children. I was told by volunteer workers in connection with the clinic that 50 per cent. of the children were saved from the courts.
I shall not go any further because I do not want to spoil the effect of the case made by Deputy Dillon. He made an exceptionally good case. I have heard on many occasions Ministers, in their replies, blundering and misrepresenting Deputies, but I never before heard a Minister trying to cover up a bad case by deliberately misrepresenting Deputies and, thus, endeavouring to carry the House with him. The suggestion of Deputy Dillon is a most worthy one. Even if the present Minister for Education or Minister for Justice or Minister for Local Government and Public Health do not adopt it, I congratulate Deputy Dillon on the matter because some future Minister for Education will see the advisability, for the sake of the children, of bringing forward such a scheme and giving us the clinic.
I feel very much like Deputy Byrne in this matter. I have almost lost sight of the point at issue on account of the matters that have been introduced by the Minister in his attempt to reply. The Minister proceeded, in the course of that reply, to give the advice to people that before they talk in this matter they should go to the court. I asked him if he had been there and he said no, but he had got reports. I wanted to hear from whom and then he told me from the justices. No doubt they give him reports to the best of their ability, but I think it should have been quite clear to any man sitting in an impartial judicial position in this matter that he might have inquired further to find out was there another side to the case than that which, say, a district justice might get put before him. I want to say, in the forefront of what I am going on to say, that as far as I know anything about the matter, the whole question of delinquent children and destitute children is receiving far better treatment. The matter is being much better treated than it used to be. That is not to say that there is no room for improvement.
Deputy Byrne has referred to individual cases. Through Deputy Byrne I got in touch with certain of these cases, and the one thing that appalled me was a comment made by the district justice in the case, that if these or other boys were not sent to industrial schools the schools might have to close. The Minister has told us about the help a district justice gets—probation officers' reports, the parents, and then I think he talked about help from clergymen and others. In the case I am speaking of the only thing that was not before the court was the report of the probation officer. The district justice said that he had such a report in front of him, but what was in that report was not revealed.
There was no question of having any criticism of what was in the report, nor was there a question put to the parents, when they gave evidence, which would indicate that the probation officer reported something different. There was no possibility, in other words, of meeting a case against the parents if the probation officer put that up. The report was kept secret. In the cases I am referring to the parents came into court in every single case, and there could be no denying the evidence given by these people that the homes were good homes, that the parents had sufficient means to keep good homes, and did in fact keep good homes, and there was not a suggestion of controversy as to the statements made that it was the first offence of which the parents had found these particular children guilty. There were letters from Christian Brothers, the superiors of schools and from nuns. Some of these children were sufficiently infantile to be still at infant schools under nuns. There were records produced from every one of these places to say the children, as far as they knew them at school, were of excellent behaviour. There was the help given, and the comment that was made by the district justice in these cases—and the only comment behind which I could find there was any real determination—was, that if sufficient children were not sent to these schools the schools might have to close. That, I must say, was an appalling situation, an appalling business, but there is this to be said in mitigation of whatever the justice would say under these circumstances— I only heard it said once—that the people who are dealing with these cases are getting a whole lot of the bad type of people coming before them, and they may occasionally err and may tar good people with the bad brush. The Minister has no such excuse. The Minister adopts that phrase. He adopted it here in the House on the last occasion—I listened to him speaking on this matter —he put forward as a defence that, if a sufficient stream of children is not going to them, the schools might have to close.
I did not put that forward.
The Minister did put that forward. It is in the records of the debate. I am not pretending to quote him, but from these benches there came a howl of protest when he said it.
If I may be allowed to explain, a Leas Cheann Comhairle, I only mentioned that in connection with the amendment that Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney had down.
In connection with some amendment, the Minister did use the phrase that if a sufficient number of children did not go to these institutions——
The Deputy ought to quote the phrase.
If the Deputy copied the Minister's quotation it would not be any great help.
I do not think the Deputy's quotations, given in this way, are very reliable.
I will go and get the quotation.
If the Minister is going to call me in question in that general way—he attempts to slander me by saying my quotations are not reliable—I would ask him to indicate any case where I was found out in giving a wrong quotation. I adhere to the suggestion that the Minister adopted the same viewpoint as, to my horror, I heard adopted by one person in a court. The Minister, who is the controller of the whole institution here, stands by that. I did get one further shock on the particular occasion I had to visit these courts. In this case it appeared quite clear at the end that, although the district justice was going to find in a certain way and sentence these children, that was not going to stand on appeal, and the question was raised as to what was going to happen to these boys while the arrangements were being made and bail bonds being entered into. The attitude adopted on that occasion in the court was that these boys would go forthwith to the institution and that they would stay in the institution even though it was only a matter of two or three hours until they were released and the bail bonds were effected. In fact, these children were torn, squalling, from their parents' arms, packed into a taxi which was hurriedly summoned, and rushed up to an industrial school. They were taken up about 4 o'clock that evening. Of course, on appeal, the matter was readjusted and they never went to the school, but they were kept there for just as long as could be managed. After that one experience, which the Minister has not had, much as I admire the work done in these courts in these matters, I am not entirely disposed just to take everything from one angle. As I say, whatever view I might have had in this matter, in connection with the courts, I see there are all sorts of excuses there. There may be verdicts that are not in accord and all sorts of reasons to excuse them, but I do not see what excuse there is for the Minister, removed from all these things, not having his mind swayed in these things at all, adopting here the view that the first thing you have to consider is the keeping alive of these institutions. If the same thing were applied to the prisons we would have everything in the nature of reform of criminals done away with simply because you might leave yourself in the situation that you would have a lot of jails built and a lot of warders and no prisoners going to them.
On this specific matter of the amendment, as I say, the amendment has been entirely submerged for me in what I have heard. I would like to say again to the Minister that I have often heard the word "reactionary" used with regard to an argument, and I have heard it used in an extravagant and misplaced way, but does the Minister now, looking back on what he has said, feel there is any other adjective to be attached to him in this matter than "reactionary"? If Dickens were alive to-day he would welcome the Minister as a person about whom he might write something. There would be reason for writing a full length novel of a psychological type about the Minister personally in his attitude to this problem. What is the simple matter that is asked for here— that there should be in connection with delinquents, not the destitute, something in the nature of a medical examination, and that there should be observation of the medical psychological type. I do not understand the Minister's arguments on this matter. On this amendment, put down on the Report Stage, he said he has not had time to consider the inter-actions that are necessary as between three Government Departments. It came out later in his speech that the commission which had sat in connection with this matter years ago reported in favour of medical examination. As far as I remember the context of their report— I have not got it with me at the moment—it was mainly in connection with contagious diseases, but they did nevertheless report in favour of medical examination. I should have thought it was the duty of any Minister bringing legislation into this House, when he pretended to found it on the report of the commission, that he should at least have considered this: What are the recommendations of the commission which I am not accepting, and what are the reasons for their nonacceptance? If he was going to consider medical examination of children suffering from contagious diseases, he could have discovered what was the difficulty about the inter-actions that would have to take place between three departments before he could get that attended to. I do not regard his arguments on the grounds of expense as worthy of a moment's consideration. There has been no thought given to the pouring out of money for lunatic schemes, and, with the record which that Government has behind it, the argument of any Minister who comes to this House to say that he objects to anything on the grounds of the expenditure which might be involved would simply not go down here.
What is the other difficulty? The Minister said that if a district justice, in a particular case, feels that there ought to be a medical examination he can get it. I do not think he can. We have asked the Minister about that, and he has advanced to the mid-way point that he does not know. I think before the debate concludes he will have advanced to the further point of saying he knows he cannot get it. I have grave doubts whether the district justice can call for and exact a medical examination.
If that is the situation, another argument of the Minister has not merely proved to be without foundation but must have been put forward by the Minister without having any background of knowledge on the point at all. There is still another matter to which Deputy O'Sullivan referred. The Minister said that we are not going to govern the children or the examination of the children in this country by comparison with a place like Chicago, the reason being that this is a Catholic city and Chicago is not. The Minister's point of view apparently is that, in a city which is not blessed with the religion we have here, you may require psychological examination of the children to see where they have gone astray, but if children go astray in a Catholic community the one thing you need not examine is their mentality. How the logic of that argument runs I cannot understand.
And the extent of the problem also.
If the problem, as Deputy Byrne has said, extended to only five children a year, and the result of investigating psychologically the cases of those five children was to discover some fault in their circumstances or their surroundings or their upbringing which could be corrected so as to save them from being sent to those institutions, would it not be worth while doing it?
Could it not be done at present?
I have asked could it.
It could, of course.
The Minister said he did not know.
Arrangements could be made for putting the child back in its home if that is considered desirable.
Without medical examination?
I cannot say.
Is not that the whole point? The Minister has now put forward the argument that if the district justice, looking at the child, thinks the fault lies somewhere in that child's surroundings or upbringing, he need not send him to one of those schools. That is missing the point entirely.
Would the Deputy tell us how medical examination would affect that question?
How it would affect delinquency?
How it would affect the district justice in determining whether the child should be sent back on the grounds of some defect in the child's character? If the Deputy is referring to a physical ailment I can understand it.
Mr. Byrne
The commission reported that there should be medical examination before sentence.
Of course they did. I have already referred to that. That recommendation was made, and has been turned down by the Minister for a reason that we have not yet been told. This matter was discussed by the commission, and they reported in favour of it. All I say is that if, when the child comes before the district justice, there is a medical report which says that the fault is not due to any inherent vice in the child, but is due to something which attention can relieve, I think it would be the bounden duty of the district justice not to send the child to the school, but to get whatever was the medical recommendation followed in order to get the particular fault eradicated from the child.
How could that be possible?
In the children's hospital.
The child is available for medical inspection for a week. On what principle could the medical officer say whether the child's lapse was due to some psychological reason?
Then the argument is that it would be an impossible thing for the medical officer to determine?
That is not the argument. I say how could the medical examination mean the difference between committing the child and not committing it if it is something inside the child's mind that is affected?
So the Minister does not think medical science has got to the point where it can diagnose something inside?
I do, but not within a week.
And, therefore, the child could not be held over to see whether a longer diagnostic period than a week would be necessary?
How long does the Minister think it takes to make that diagnosis?
I imagine the child has to be under observation for a fairly considerable time.
So instead of having it under observation, the best thing is to ram it into an institution and have no observation? Is that the system?
It could hardly be done under this amendment.
If it cannot be done under this, it may be necessary to have this amendment extended.
Or altered.
In any event, the Minister's alternative is not to have any examination at all for fear something might be revealed that would require attention instead of simply packing the child off to an institution. I think the Minister is getting deeper into the mire according as his scanty store of information is being added to. It becomes quite clear that the Minister has not considered the commission's report, the evidence given before the commission or any argument for or against the proposal. The only thing he falls back upon is the view that if you do not keep the courts grinding out people for those institutions the institutions may close down, and, to the bureaucratic mind, that is the last emergency. As I say, I feel that the amendment is one which might be pressed, but it is really hopeless to pretend to deal with any measure of this sort as long as we have the mentality which the Minister has revealed in the course of the debate.
Does the Minister still doubt the accuracy of Deputy McGilligan's quotation? I have got the report here if he cares to have it read for him.
Read it.
The Minister wants it read?
Certainly.
Then let us read it for him. It is reported at Column 1880, Vol. 81, No. 7.
It is worth while recording that this was said in the year 1941.
Yes; 5th February, 1941. Here is what the Minister for Education said:
If the Deputy feels that more ought to be done for destitute children in another way I think he ought to raise the matter in a different fashion. At present he wants to benefit these children, assuming that his own theories are the right ones, at the expense of the industrial schools and possibly at the expense of closing down all the industrial schools altogether. Of course, I could not stand for that....
The Minister goes on for another half a column. Does he want me to quote him?
I want the Deputy to finish the sentence.
This is what the Minister added:
Of course, I could not stand for that, and I am satisfied that the schools are carrying on an essential work and carrying it on satisfactorily.
Does that cover the ground? We have the astonishing thesis that the schools are to be kept for the purpose of looking after destitute children and there is no consideration whether the arrangements made in respect of destitute children are the most suitable. However, let the Minister's word stand and let the public judge.
I should like to say something in support of this amendment, particularly as the Minister said that Deputy Dillon seemed to be alone in the House and there was no other Deputy of the same opinion, with possibly, the exception of Deputy Byrne. Deputy Dillon has made a very good case. In fact, a good many of us refrained from speaking after Deputy Dillon because we felt we would only be repeating his arguments. I am a country Deputy and this amendment applies principally to the city of Dublin. Deputy Dillon merely asks that an experiment be made in Dublin, but I should like to have experiments carried out through the provinces and let them be applied not alone to delinquent children, but eventually to the numerous destitute children who are committed. I do not want to enter into any arguments with the Minister on psychology. I do not think I am fitted any better than the Minister to go into psychological discussions.
Now, Deputy, do not be too hard on yourself.
When he was making a case against the amendment, the Minister, when he compared Chicago and Dublin, took up the attitude of the Pharisee—"We are not like other people, thank God; we are giving the children Christian treatment." He ended up his argument by suggesting that Deputy Dillon was insinuating that the children in Dublin—where they get good, Christian care, as everybody knows—were not getting proper treatment in the religious institutions. There was no such insinuation made. The Minister, in his rather heated defence, put it this way, that we in this country have put these children in institutions where they are taught religion and he said that was better than any psychological treatment we could give them. These may not have been his exact words, but they are as near as common English can go.
I am not going to say anything against religious treatment. Everybody knows that as far as religion is concerned the children are well cared for, but religious treatment is not the only treatment that should be applied to children who, because of destitution or delinquency, are committed to industrial or other schools. One could argue that there are psychological reasons why certain children are delinquents, and various reasons can be put forward why certain children are destitute, such as lack of care—that parents were not capable of caring properly for their children. For one reason or another the State assumes care of children, either because the parents are unable or unfitted to take care of them or because of some delinquency. In these circumstances the State assumes the function of guardian of the children, and proper provision is made for their up-keep.
So far as proper provision is concerned, I suggest that it should not be confined to what the natural guardians would have applied to the children. Most of the parents are in poor circumstances, and I suggest more is required than what the natural guardians would have provided. The State ought to make every provision for the children placed in its care, and they should see to it that the children get every opportunity to become respectable citizens. If there are any defects in a child's surroundings that would make the road to such a desired result difficult, they ought to be wiped away. If, in other countries, they have found that observation schools have produced good results and that a psychological as well as a physical examination has produced evidence that certain treatment for different children is desirable, then we ought to follow their example.
I am more interested in the care of destitute children than in delinquency, because destitute children come more within my sphere than delinquents. Anybody who has had experience of children knows that every child has a different disposition. I believe that committed children require greater medical and other care than ordinary children. If one is permitted to expand the theory to the training of animals, any man or woman who has had experience of animal training—I have had some experience of that—will know that even amongst animals you cannot approach any two of them in the same way. One is gentle and the other is vicious and the treatment you apply to one cannot successfully be applied to the other. That applies to a greater extent in the case of human beings. There are no two children in ordinary schools who are similar in disposition. In the case of the delinquent, the difference is multipled a thousand-fold. For natural or physical reasons the children are incapable, in some cases, of imbibing the teaching given to an ordinary child.
It is not enough for the Minister to tell us that the State has provided that the children will be sent to religious institutions and that their souls will be taken care of. We want their bodies, their physical beings, to be taken care of, so that they will grow up not alone good Christian, religious citizens, but good citizens in other respects, good in intellect and physique, and that it can be said that the State has done everything possible for their development. I am sorry that the amendment has not a wider scope.
Amendment put.
The Committee divided: Tá, 35; Níl, 59.
Tá
- Bennett, George C.
- Benson, Ernest E.
- Broderick, William J.
- Browne, Patrick.
- Burke, Patrick.
- Byrne, Alfred.
- Byrne, Alfred (Junior).
- Coburn, James.
- Cosgrave, William T.
- Costello, John A.
- Dillon, James M.
- Doyle, Peadar S.
- Everett, James.
- Fagan, Charles.
- Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
- Giles, Patrick.
- Hickey, James.
- Hughes, James.
- Hurley, Jeremiah.
- Keating, John.
- Linehan, Timothy.
- Lynch, Finian.
- McFadden, Michael Og.
- McGilligan, Patrick.
- McGovern, Patrick.
- Mongan, Joseph W.
- Morrissey, Daniel.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- Nally, Martin.
- O'Donovan, Timothy J.
- O'Sullivan, John M.
- Pattison, James P.
- Reynolds, Mary.
- Rogers, Patrick J.
- Ryan, Jeremiah.
Níl
- Aiken, Frank.
- Allen, Denis.
- Bartley, Gerald.
- Beegan, Patrick.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Bourke, Dan.
- Brady, Brian.
- Brady, Seán.
- Breathnach, Cormac.
- Breen, Daniel.
- Breslin, Cormac.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Corry, Martin J.
- Crowley, Tadhg.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- De Valera, Eamon.
- Flynn, John.
- Flynn, Stephen.
- Fogarty, Andrew.
- Fogarty, Patrick J.
- Friel, John.
- Fuller, Stephen.
- Gorry, Patrick J.
- Harris, Thomas.
- Hogan, Daniel.
- Keane, J.J.
- Kelly, James P.
- Kelly, Thomas.
- Kennedy, Michael J.
- Kissane, Eamon.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Loughman, Francis.
- Lynch, James B.
- McCann, John.
- McDevitt, Henry A.
- McEllistrim, Thomas.
- MacEntee, Seán.
- Maguire, Ben.
- Meaney, Cornelius.
- Morrissey, Michael.
- Mullen, Thomas.
- Munnelly, John.
- O Briain, Donnchadh.
- O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
- O'Grady, Seán.
- O'Loghlen, Peter J.
- O'Reilly, Matthew.
- O'Sullivan, Ted.
- Rice, Brigid M.
- Ruttledge, Patrick J.
- Ryan, James.
- Ryan, Robert.
- Sheridan, Michael.
- Smith, Patrick.
- Traynor, Oscar.
- Victory, James.
- Walsh, Laurence J.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Conn.
Tellers: Tá: Deputies Doyle and Bennett; Níl: Deputies Smith and S. Brady.
Question declared lost.
The following amendment appeared on the order paper in the name of Deputy O'Sullivan:
In page 3, before Section 8, to insert a new section as follows:—
The Minister for Justice shall have power to acquire compulsorily or by agreement such land not exceeding in any case one half of a statute acre as may be required for the purpose of providing playgrounds or other amenities for any place of detention provided by him under Section 108 of the Principal Act, as a remand home for the care and detention of children and youthful offenders pending the making of an order for committal to an approved school or other determination by a court of competent jurisdiction.
This amendment is out of order.
Perhaps you would be good enough to indicate the grounds on which it is out of order.
This amendment seeks to empower the Minister for Justice to acquire lands for the provision of playgrounds for certain places of detention. As the exercise by the Minister of this power would involve the expenditure of public moneys, the amendment creates a potential charge on the Exchequer and may not be moved by a private Deputy. On other grounds, the amendment introduces a new principle, not dealt with in the Bill nor raised on Committee Stage. It would not, therefore, be a proper amendment on this stage.
May I point out that we have just discussed at some length an amendment that might seem to involve public expenditure as much as this? They are both empowering amendments. Secondly, may I point out that there is a clause in the Bill dealing with the particular schools and playgrounds? I think that would be found in Section 7. I wish to direct the Minister's attention to that, and think an opportunity should be given to do so. If I am ruled out of order, I will willingly accept your ruling, though I would like some clarification of the point.
Will the Deputy not accept the clarification given?
I should like to know, firstly, whether the last amendment is out of order, and, secondly, whether there is not a reference to playgrounds and buildings in the Bill already. Realising that there might be a difficulty of this kind, I was anxious to bring the matter to the attention of the Minister. It has been pointed out here to-day that Summerhill, for instance, is an excellent institution, well run, and kept very clean, but that it has no adequate playground whatsoever. Half an acre will not impoverish the State, whatever anything else may do. It is a pity there should not be given to the Minister an opportunity of this kind. Elsewhere perhaps, when it comes to another House, he will have an opportunity to deal with this problem, since I cannot deal with it here, and he may be able to move an amendment then.
I move amendment No. 3:—
In page 3, line 47, to insert before section 9 (a) a new paragraph as follows:—
(a) by the deletion of the word "fourteen" and the substitution in lieu thereof of the word "fifteen".
This amendment is introduced in deference to the views expressed by Deputies in the course of Dáil debates and having regard to the recommendation made in paragraph 44 of the Commission of Inquiry on Industrial Schools, where it is recommended that the maximum age for committal to industrial schools should be raised from 14 to 15 years. This was not proposed in the Bill, as it was understood that the managers would, as a rule, be opposed to it on the ground that they could not effect much improvement in one year and that, for physiological reasons, particularly in the case of girls, this restriction would be undesirable. It is felt now, however, that, having regard to the matter which was raised on the last Stage of the Bill—that the number of such cases would be small and that the managers have the right of refusal under the existing Act—there seems to be no reason why we should not introduce this amendment.
I think that I departed from the correct description of the provisions of the Bill on the last stage, when I referred to 16 years where I should have said 14. Fourteen is the maximum age for committal. Of course, the children can be kept until they reach 16. The idea of this amendment is to increase from 14 to 16 the age at which children may be committed.
A number of points were raised on that whole section on the last day and some of them were considered to be of supreme importance, involving important principles. The Minister undertook to consider in the interval between the Committee Stage and the Report Stage how far he could meet our views and, though I had very recently to express profound dissatisfaction with the Minister's attitude on another matter, I can say that on this one he has met the principal points in the series of amendments which he has put down now.
Amendment agreed to.
I wish to ask the permission of the House to withdraw amendment No. 4 as on the Order Paper and to propose instead the following amendment as circulated to-day:—
In page 3, line 48, Section 9, to add at the end of paragraph (e) the words "and by the deletion in the said paragraph of the words ‘no parent or guardian, or'".
The Children Act, 1908—Section 58— says:—
(1) Any person may bring before a petty sessional court any person apparently under the age of 14 years who—
(b) is found wandering and not having any home or settled place of abode, or visible means of subsistence, or is found wandering and having no parent or guardian, or a parent or guardian who does not exercise proper guardianship;
We decided to recommend to the Dáil that the words "wandering and" be deleted, and that amendment was carried; and, as the Act would now stand it would be:—
(b) is found not having any home or settled place of abode, or visible means of subsistence, or is found having no parent or guardian, or a parent or guardian who does not exercise proper guardianship;
Deputy McGilligan pointed out that "having no parent or guardian" did not seem to make sense. In any case, it is provided for otherwise by a special section in the original Act, which provides for orphans. The Deputy pointed out that, whereas taking out the words "wandering and" in the first case might be all right, taking them out in the second case would leave a rather indefinite phrase. It would read:—
or is found having no parent or guardian, or a parent or guardian who does not exercise proper guardianship;
In any case, in order to meet the Deputy's point, we are now proposing to take out the words "no parent or guardian, or".
Not having the Act before me, I cannot say that I am quite clear on this, but I take it that the Minister's contention is that this is to make what is in the Bill more sensible?
Yes, more sensible.
Well, I should certainly agree to that.
Amendment put and agreed to.
I move amendment No. 5:—
In page 3, lines 49 to 52, to delete Section 9 (b).
I agree that imprisonment or penal servitude of a parent should not, of itself, constitute a ground for committal, as there might be cases where one parent might be in prison and the other might be attending satisfactorily to the welfare of the children, and where there was no danger of destitution. Section 58 (1) (c) of the Principal Act is allowed to stand. That clause reads: where a child—
is found destitute, not being an orphan and having both parents or his surviving parent, or in the case of an illegitimate child his mother undergoing penal servitude or imprisonment.
We are leaving that, providing for committal where a child is found destitute and having both parents or his surviving parent, or the mother in the case of an illegitimate child, undergoing penal servitude or imprisonment, but we are introducing an amendment in Section 9 (e). That would be amendment No. 8, which is in two parts. We are amending it, as compared with the amendments with which we have dealt before, so as to put it in the same category as the cases covered by the 1929 Act. That provides for cases of destitution where parental consent is required before an order for committal can be made, and what we are providing under this other amendment is that where one of the parents is undergoing imprisonment or penal servitude the consent of that parent may be dispensed with.
Amendment put and agreed to.
I move amendment No. 6:—
In page 4, lines 1 to 4, to delete Section 9 (c) and substitute the following paragraph:—
(c) by the insertion in paragraph (d), before the word "criminal" of the word "reputed,".
This amendment is to meet the point raised on the last stage. We are accepting the suggestion of Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney that the word "reputed" has a particular meaning in the courts, and that it would be an advantage to add it in this case. Otherwise, we are leaving the Bill as it stood.
Are you not taking out the whole sub-section?
This is amendment No. 6—which proposes to delete Section 9 (c).
We are leaving the clause which reads:—
(d) is under the care of a parent or guardian who, by reason of criminal or drunken habits is unfit to have the care of the child.
I had contemplated changing that, but now we are coming back to it, with the addition of the word "reputed."
You are leaving the Act as it stands, but amending the Bill by knocking out Section 9 (c) and therefore knocking out the words to which we object: "for any reason"?
We are not interfering with paragraph (d) in the Principal Act, except to insert the word "reputed."
Oh, I see. That is right.
Amendment put and agreed to.
I move amendment No. 7:
In page 4, section 9 (d), to delete in lines 13 and 14 the words "section 12 of this Act in relation to the child" and substitute the words "Part II of this Act or mentioned in the First Schedule to this Act in relation to any of his children, whether legitimate or illegitimate."
This also covers a point to which I promised to give some attention.
I take it that the point is that the offence should have something to do with the child or children in the house?
Yes, and even though there are certain offences, such as abduction, which could not be very well attributed to the parents of the child—since a parent could hardly abduct his own child—still the general principle is agreed upon that if an offence of this nature is committed with regard to any of the children, all the children may be affected.
Amendment put and agreed to.
I move amendment No. 8:
In page 4, section 9 (e), to delete lines 24 to 32 and substitute the following:—
(ii) the Court is satisfied that owing to mental incapacity or desertion on the part of the child's parents or his surviving parent or, in the case of an illegitimate child, his mother, the consent of such parents or parent may be dispensed with, or
(iii) one of the child's parents consents to such order being made and the Court is satisfied that, owing to mental incapacity or desertion on the part of the other parent or to the fact that the other parent is undergoing imprisonment or penal servitude, the consent of that parent may be dispensed with.
On the last stage I withdrew an amendment to consider whether the word "mental" should not be put in before "incapacity" and it is now being put in as suggested. The effect of the amendment, if accepted by the Dáil, would be that we would have three different methods of dealing with consent. First, there is the plain case where the child is destitute and both persons agree. There is no difficulty there and it is provided for under the law already. The second case will be covered by paragraph (ii), where "the court is satisfied that owing to mental incapacity or desertion on the part of a child's parent or his surviving parent or, in the case of an illegitimate child, his mother, the consent of such parents or parent may be dispensed with." If there is mental incapacity or desertion, the consent of the parents or the surviving parent may be dispensed with.
The third case is where "(iii) one of the child's parents consents to such order being made and the court is satisfied that, owing to mental incapacity or desertion on the part of the other parent, or to the fact that the other parent is undergoing imprisonment or penal servitude, the consent of that parent may be dispensed with". It is not likely, if one parent is only in prison for a short period, that the other parent will agree to have the child committed, and I think we can take it, therefore, that it is only for very good reasons, and where the second parent is going to be in prison for a considerable time, that the parent at liberty is going to agree.
Amendment put and agreed to.
I move amendment No. 9:—
In page 8, to insert before Section 22 (1) a new sub-section as follows:—
(1) Section 131 of the Principal Act is hereby amended by the deletion of the word "fourteen" where the word occurs in the definition of the expression "child" and the substitution in lieu of the word so deleted of the word "fifteen".
This amendment is linked to amendment No. 3, on which it is consequential.
Amendment put and agreed to.
Question:—"That the Bill, as amended, be received for final consideration"—put and agreed to.
When is it proposed to take the Fifth Stage?
If there is no objection, I should like to take it to-morrow.
When?
To-morrow.
If there is no objection. Perhaps, Sir, it could be ordered provisionally for to-morrow?
For to-morrow, then.