asked the Minister for Education if he will ensure that Dublin children in industrial schools located a long distance from their homes will be supplied with free travel tickets to return to their homes during the summer holidays.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Travel Tickets for Industrial School Children.
Mr. Byrne
I regret that there are no funds in the Estimates for my Department from which free travel tickets could be provided for children returning home on holidays from industrial schools.
Mr. Byrne
Will the Minister say from what fund the tickets were provided to send Dublin children to industrial schools in Cork and Galway, and whether or not the same fund is available to return them to their mothers when they get summer holidays? What is the difference between providing tickets to send them down and providing tickets to send them home? I would press for a reply. The Minister cannot merely look at us.
Surely the Minister will tell us whether or not he proposes to take any steps to relieve a situation wherein a poor child is given a few weeks' holiday out of an industrial school to go home to his parents and cannot come because he has no money to pay his railway fare. Surely the Minister will say, if there is not a fund, that he will take steps to provide a fund, or give some evidence of sympathy with that situation.
I have nothing to add.
Does the Minister approve of the situation in which the children of the poor of this city who are in industrial schools, when granted a holiday, cannot take the holiday because there is no money in their homes to pay for their ticket? Is that just?
Mr. Byrne
Might I ask the Minister for Justice if he will consider the matter?
The question is addressed to the Minister for Education.
Mr. Byrne
It is the Department of the Minister for Justice that deals with them and sends them to the industrial school.
The question is addressed to one Minister, and the Deputy must address supplementaries to the same Minister.
Mr. Byrne
What am I to do?
Raise the matter on the adjournment.
Mr. Byrne
I will raise it on the adjournment, with your permission, Sir.