Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 16 Jun 1953

Vol. 139 No. 9

Committee on Finance. - Vote 39—Office of the Minister for Education—(Resumed).

Mr. Desmond

There are some points in the Minister's statement in connection with this Estimate with which we certainly agree. One of these points, I am pleased to observe, has reference to the continual expansion and building of new schools and the reconstruction of others. Unfortunately many of our schools had fallen into a very bad condition. It is true to say that if this problem had been attacked some years ago, both the State who have to furnish a large part of the expenditure by way of grants, and the local people who have to raise the remainder, would have saved money. It is well, however, even at this stage to see that people generally are facing up to the responsibility of keeping schools in proper condition and that the programme is proceeding in the way that we all would wish, particularly in rural areas where as many of us are aware, the accommodation for pupils was very primitive.

I also agree with the Minister in his comments in regard to the desirability of local people accepting a certain share of the responsibility. It is apity to find every section in the community clamouring, as it were, to the State for assistance of all sorts. I think it would be deplorable if, even in rural areas, we reached the stage where the people failed to recognise their responsibility for providing some contribution towards the upkeep of the schools. It is of primary importance that parents should see that school buildings once they are put into a proper condition by the State are kept in that condition. I will say for the people in rural areas that, if this is put plainly to them, they will not shirk their responsibility for keeping the school in a proper state of repair.

There are a few points, however, in regard to which I differ from the Minister. I mentioned them before but perhaps, as the Minister said in his statement, we may be misinformed. If so, that is one problem that still exists. I consider that no matter what trade or profession young people enter they must of necessity, first of all, serve a certain number of years apprenticeship to it. When we speak of these problems that face us it is because of the fact that each one of us did serve an apprenticeship in the primary schools or, as they are more commonly known in the country, national schools. Perhaps we did not avail to the full extent of the opportunities afforded to us in the course of that apprenticeship but I still maintain that such views as we do express in regard to these problems are based on the knowledge that we and our neighbours in these rural areas acquired in these schools. I was sorry that the Minister last year pointed out that he differed completely with the views I expressed on one particular item—that is the problem of schoolbooks. This system was not introduced when the present Minister took over responsibility for the Department. Indeed, the Minister's predecessors must accept the same responsibility. I fail to understand why parents should have such heavy imposts placed upon them year after year in connection with the purchase of new school textbooks. If two children in the same family are attending the same school and one is in third class and the other is in fourthclass, there is no reason why the child moving up from third to fourth should not use the textbooks that her sister or brother used the year before. I fail to understand why parents should be told that the textbooks current in the year 1952 must be scrapped in the year 1953 and that the child moving from third to fourth cannot use the books used by a brother or a sister in that class. I think there is some kind of a ramp in connection with these books. I do not say the Minister or any of his predecessors are or were involved in that ramp. Undoubtedly a minority is gaining at the expense of a majority and, in this instance, the majority is representative of the parents of school-going children throughout the country.

This problem needs a closer study than it has been given in the past. Such heavy burdens should not be imposed on parents. We have reached a stage now when school textbooks represent a very costly item in the family budget and for that reason alone some steps will have to be taken to remedy the present position.

The Minister in his statement referred to the setting of specific courses in the various schools. He adverted to the teaching of woodwork, agriculture, rural science and domestic economy. The present curriculum may be suitable from the point of view of Dublin City and Cork City but it is not suitable from the point of view of the rural areas. The purpose of primary education, as the Minister pointed out, is the development and formation of character and the training of the child to do certain things correctly. Considering the present curriculum in the primary schools, is it any wonder that the young people are emigrating or fleeing from the rural areas into the cities and towns? The present programme has a definitely commercial bias. No attempt is made to awaken the child's interest to the importance of agriculture and rural life. Added to that is the fact that there are not sufficient openings in commercial life to absorb all the young people. The Minister says we cannot overload the programme. I believe rural science is a subject which would be of tremendous value to children in the ruralareas because it will open children's eyes to the significance of nature and will pave the way ultimately to a proper appreciation of agriculture. Girls in the primary schools should be taught the fundamentals of domestic economy. It is a mistake to encourage children in the rural areas into commercial life. The programme should be one that will encourage children to adopt careers that will hold them in the rural areas. In that way we will do something to stop the tide of emigration and, more important still, build up rural Ireland.

In connection with county council scholarships to secondary schools there is a certain weakness. Undoubtedly these scholarships are a great help but the amount awarded is not always sufficient and parents are often called upon to make up the deficiency. I think a flat rate should be introduced. I know the Minister has no real jurisdiction in the matter and he has no compulsion over local authorities, but if a flat rate was introduced parents would know exactly where they stood. It is hardly fair that a child should be asked to forego the advantage of a secondary education merely because his parents are not in a position to supplement the scholarship awarded to him.

The Minister mentioned the increase in the number of secondary schools. That is very satisfactory indeed. We hear many complaints of the standard of education going down and from that point of view it is a good thing to know that secondary schools are actually increasing in number throughout the country. In connection with examinations in the secondary schools, is it correct that music does not get its rightful place? Is it correct that a pupil doing music in a secondary school must pay a fee of 10/6 if he or she wishes to enter for an examination in that subject?

That, surely, is not an incentive or an encouragement to pupils to take music as one of the subjects in the examination. I think that the Department should encourage such a subject. I believe there is nothing that would help us more than the fact that ouryoung boys and girls were concentrating on the study of music. It would be much better that they should do so than have them enjoying some of the tin-can jazz music that we hear over the radio. Most of us here are well aware that in the rural Ireland of the past the pride of any household was the man who was able to play the fiddle, or as we term it now, the violin, or the man who at the cross roads provided music with his accordion. The Minister will admit that music has always held a place of honour in rural Ireland but now our children are to be forced to pay an extra fee of 10/6 if they take music as a subject at examinations. I do not think that is right. I believe that encouragement should be given to this special branch of education—that it should be given the place of honour that it deserves.

I also believe that from the secondary. schools encouragement should come for choral singing. Even under the British régime in this country, so far as I am aware, there was more encouragement given to this subject than there is at the present time. These are two problems which come from the secondary school side. To some people they may not seem to be of much importance, but I believe they are of very great importance to children who may be anxious to take them as subjects at examinations. The Minister, I think, should give consideration to the question as to why an extra charge of 10/6 is made in the case of pupils who take those subjects.

We all realise that the foundation of our educational system is the primary or national school. If boys and girls are lucky enough, through means of county council scholarships, to pass from the national to the secondary school, they can then enjoy the advantages of the advanced training provided there. In that connection, I do not believe that we realise to the full the great credit that is due to some of the teaching orders who conduct our secondary schools, or the wonderful help given to this country through the Irish Christian Brothers. There are many young Corkmen in good positions in the City of Dublinto-day. It may be that they came up with single tickets, but, at any rate, they came up because of the fine education they received in the North Monastery or Sullivan's Quay schools in Cork. Their success in life has been largely due to the great training they got in those schools. I believe, however, that we have some secondary schools wherein a danger lies in this sense that part of the training is concentrated on etiquette and all that is connected with it, such as snobocracy and autocracy. That does not apply to such schools as those conducted by the Irish Christian Brothers. We have good reason to be proud of them. In some of those other secondary schools that I have indicated the system of the old school tie is inclined to become more pronounced every day. I believe that the farther we get away from that the better.

The Minister stated that, in his opinion, the most important subjects in the primary schools should be Irish, English and mathematics. If boys and girls get a good foundation in those subjects in the primary schools, and are then lucky enough to be able to get to a secondary school, they will have been well prepared for the advanced studies which they will have to face there. They will, for example, have been well prepared for the examinations held in connection with appointments to ordinary clerkships under the local authorities. Naturally, it is a great advantage to the boy or the girl who secures one of these appointments. As far as I understand, the papers which are set for these examinations by the local authority examiners comply with the rules and regulations laid down by the Department of Education. If I mention any point in connection with this, it is not to be taken that I am objecting or finding fault either with the local authorities or with the people who set the papers because I realise that they are simply carrying out their duties within the framework of the regulations laid down for them. It does, however, seem senseless to me that a boy or a girl who sits for an examination for appointment as clerk in a county counciloffice should be asked questions in history of a standard or type that I believe is not in line with our own national interest.

I do not agree with the history questions which are set for these examinations. I am not going to mention any names. If boys and girls at these examinations were asked to write an essay on the history of 1916 or 1920, I certainly would be proud of them if it showed that they were familiar with these periods of our history. But surely, it is fantastic to ask boys and girls sitting for an examination for a local authority appointment a question such as this: "Write an account of the incursions of the Northmen into the Continent of Europe, dealing with the effects they produced. Did they make any permanent settlement?" Is it not, as I say, fantastic to ask a person seeking a clerkship in a county council office a question such as that, or a question such as this: "Trace the growth of Spanish power under Ferdinand and Isabella and account for the subsequent decline." Is it not a joke to ask boys and girls to cram their minds and their brains with a knowledge of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain when we know very well that their work in a county council office will be to deal with the case of some poor farmer—at least he will tell them that he is poor—who comes in to say that he cannot pay his rates? Another question that may be asked is: "Describe the principal stages in the unification of Germany or Italy in the 19th century." Would it not be more compatible with present-day conditions, and more correct, to ask them for their views as to how we can bring about the unification of the 32 Counties in our own small country?

I believe that our line of approach in connection with these examinations is rather antiquated. I agree, of course, that questions in history should be asked. Why not ask them questions about Pearse and Connolly and of others of our 1916 men, some of whom are still alive—or indeed of our present Minister—and tell what they knew of them? But let us forget about some of the nonsensical questions which applicants for county council clerkships areexpected to be able to answer. I believe, too, that we could do very well without asking questions in Latin at these local authority examinations. By all means, as the Minister mentioned at the start, it is important for boys and girls to have a good knowledge of Irish, English and arithmetic, and after that of the historical past of our country.

The last point I would mention is one on which most of us perhaps have different views, not in this House but in the country as a whole. If you speak completely in favour of the Irish language you are an ultra-nationalist out on your own. If you try to explain that you believe that we should try to adopt a middle of the road policy then you are very doubtful, and probably anti-nationalist. It is not so many years since we were in school, and if one looks back one remembers that we took a pride, and always will take pride, please God, in a knowledge of the Irish language and all it stands for. But I consider that our advantage was that we learned Irish as a subject. I know that one of the problems confronting parents at present is this: their boys and girls going to national schools come back in the evening with problems in arithmetic. The parent is anxious to help the child with the problem, but when the question is in Irish and the child is doing it through the medium of Irish and is stumped half-way, his parents are not conversant enough with Irish to help. Surely the child is suffering by such a system.

I believe that boys and girls could be encouraged to love the language of their country and all that it holds for the people of the country more securely and more sincerely than by being compelled, as they have been, to try to learn other subjects through the medium of Irish. I am speaking from our own experience and knowing the advantages of it, and I am also speaking from the knowledge I have gained from parents whose children are at a disadvantage when the parents cannot help them. In many instances it is not the fault of the parents.

There is another side to that problem. There is unfortunately the parent who is ready to condemn the language; and the child hearing his parents complaning about the language—parents may not know the language and may not be able to converse in it—is encouraged not to learn Irish as a subject. The parents then are not aware of how backward the child can be. I believe that we should kill this section who are, as it were, intellectually trying to scoff at the language. We should help the children in a better way if we concentrated on the language for reading and writing and, above all, speaking in the language. This way would be better perhaps than trying to inculcate other subjects and giving less time to the language itself, beautiful as it is, to the detriment of the children.

Finally I would like to draw attention to one feature of our Irish life that is becoming more prominent. Every new board that is set up or every new commission that is appointed bears an Irish name. I am asking, when these new names in Irish are given to these boards and commissions, is the Minister or the officials in his Department consulted as to the wisdom of the name so given or as to whether those names are correct or not? I believe that no Department, whether it is Industry and Commerce or any other Department, should put an Irish name on any new venture without consulting the Minister for Education and his staff. There was a name brought before the people of this country and before the people of other countries quite recently—a name in Irish. I would like to know did the Minister or his Department have anything to do with the checking up of the real meaning of the word or not. I am speaking of the word "Tóstal".

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Surely the Minister for Education is not responsible for that?

Mr. Desmond

It being an Irish word I maintain that, in fairness to the Minister, I should ask the Minister my point and inquire as to whether the attention of his Department was drawn to that word. Many people have been inquiring as to whatis the English meaning of the word and I have known school teachers who are not able to give a definition of it except that they got an understanding that it means "at home". Now strange to say I have been checking on an old Irish-English dictionary, by O'Reilly, published here in Dublin in 1821 and the word "Tóstal" comes into it, and the only English definition for the word "Tóstal" in that dictionary is "arrogance, pride, envy". The word "Tostallach" also appears and is the only word in connection with it, and the English definition is "presumptuous, presuming, and arrogant". I think it is totally unfair that any other Department of State should be prepared to use titles for any of our boards without consulting the Department of Education and their responsible officials. That is all I have to say on it but I should be glad if the Minister would tell us about Irish meanings and whether such words were used without his authority or the authority of his Department.

Risteárd Ua Maolchatha

Molaim go mor an rud atá ráidhte ag an Teachta Deasmhumhan agus ná tóg orm é má deirim gur dóigh liom go bhfuil an ceart aige. Nuair bhí an tAire ag caint an lá fé dheireadh dúirt sé:—

"Ach ní'I ann ach an t-aon teanga amháin gur linn féin í, go bhfuil ár ndúchas agus ár n-oidhreacht fite intí, a múnlaiodh ar intinn mhuintir na hÉireann agus gurb í fealsúnacht ár sinsir is anál anama di; sí sin an Ghaeilge."

An chéad rud atá, le rá agam ar an Meastachán so baineann sé le pointe a bhí á luadh ag an Teachta, Deasmhumhan. Is mó fadhb a bhí ag baint, le teanga na Gaeilge agus aithbheochaint na Gaeilge nuair cuireadh an Stát ar bun ar dtús agus cheapamar nuair a bheadh ár réim féin ans na scoileanna, dá gcuirtí an obair chun cinn i gceart go mbeadh an Ghaeilge sabháilte ach chímíd anois, tar éis 30 bliain, nach mar sin an scéal. Gídh go bhfuil sár-obair á déanamh ins na scoileanna agus gachscoil díobh, go mór-mhór na bunscoileanna agus na meán-scoileanna, tá an Ghaeilge gan sábháil fós. Ar dtús, nuair tháinig Rialtas Gaelach anseo agus nuair cuireadh an Dáil ar bun bhí orainn na hAchtanna a chur i bhfeidhm agus iad d'fhoilsiú i nGaeilge. Bhí rudaí le déanamh againn chun réiteach a dhéanamh leis an teangain d'oiriúnú chuige sin agus cuireadh Rannóg an Aistriúcháin ar bun. Ní mar a céanna an aigne a bhí againn i dtaobh litriú na Gaeilge nó na gcanúint. Socraíodh sa Dáil ar an cló romhánach a chur i bhfeidhm, ar shimpliu beag a dhéanamh ar an litriú.

Níor mhór canúint éigin a cheapadh i dtreo is gur mar a chéile an chaint sna hAchtanna, agus socraíodh ar chanúint an Athar Peadar a ghlacadh chuige sín. Dheineadar comh-réir nua, "syntax" simplí, a dhéanamh agus, cé go raibh canúint an Athar Peadar mar chanúint againn, i dtreo is go mbeidh saibhreas Gaeilge Chúige Chonnacht agus saibhreas Gaeilge Dhún na nGall anseo againn sa Dáil, fuaireadh cainteoirí ó Dhún na nGall agus ó Chonnacht agus bhíodar anseo i Rannóig an Aistriúcháin agus chuamar ar aghaidh leis an gcóras san. Ní raibh Fianna Fáil sásta leis an obair seo agus nuair a tháinig Rialtas Fianna Fáil isteach anseo, dheineadar athrú air sin. Dheineadar athrú beag ar an litriú; dheineadar an litriú níos faide ná an litriú a bhí ceaptha ag Rannóig an Aistriúcháin. Ach, tar éis tamaill, fuaradar amach go raibh an ceart ag na daoine a bhí ag riaradh na cainte sna hAchtanna agus ansan dheineadar an litriú a chaighdeánú. Tá sé caighdeánaithe anois agus tá glactha leis ag formhór na ndaoine atá ag scríobh. Tá glactha leis ag an Roinn Oideachais, cé go bhfuil roint údar nach bhfuil sásta go gcuirfí amach a gcuid leabhar sa litriú nua. Cé gur deineadh caighdeán nua ar an litriú sin, ní dheachaigh éinne i gcomhairle leis an Roinn oideachais, leis na cainteoirí, le lucht na n-ollscol, leis na húdair féin, nuair a bhíodar ag ceapadh litrithe nua don Ghaeilge. Deineadh an litriú nua gan an obair sin a chur fé bhráid an Aire Oideachais, na hAireachta Oideachais, na n-údar, na gcainteoir, ná éinne go raibh aon bhaint aigelehobair na Gaeilge sna scoileanna nó le hobair na scríbhneoirí. Is ait an scéal ar fad é sin.

Pé ar domhan é, tá glactha leis an gcaighdeán nua, gí go bhfuil constaicí anseo is ansiúd le réiteach fós mar gheall air. Is dóigh liom go bhfuil na leabhra go léir atá á n-úsáid sna scoileanna á gclóbhualadh anois sa chló nua.

Airímid anois go bhfuil rud eile á dhéanamh agus gan aon bhaint ag aon duine atá dhá dhéanamh leis an Roinn Oideachais, ná gan aon chomhairle fachta ón Roinn Oideachais ná ó chainteoirí ná ó údair—sé sin, go bhfuil daoine sa tír seo agus tá na focail á n-athrú acu. Ní fheadar cé uaidh a bhfuaireadar an t-údarás ach airímid go bhfuil an graiméar nua ceaptha.

I gcás litrithe nua, is féidir focal d'athrú agus gan cur isteach ar chaint na ndaoine, ach is rud eile é an graiméar. Ba mhaith liom rud éigin a chloisint ón Aire mar gheall ar an ngraiméar seo, do réir mar airímid, má tá graiméir nua déanta, agus "syntax" nó comhréir nua ceaptha. Deineadh é sin agus níor cuireadh ceist, níor glacadh comhairle le cainteoiri, le lucht na nollscol, le lucht Scoil an Ard-Léinn ná le haon údar a raibh aithne air in aon chor.

Ba mhaíth liom a íarraidh ar an Aire conas atá an scéal i dtaobh an ghraiméir seo? An mbeidh cead ag éinne leabhair a scríobh í gcóír na scoileanna ná beidh bunaithe ar an ngraiméar seo? An mbeidh sé éigeantach, cuir i gcás, sa Ghaeltacht, leabhair d'úsáid a bheas scríofa agus bunaithe ar an ngraíméar seo?

Cad is dóigh leís a thíocfaidh ar obair na scoileanná sa Ghaeltacht má déantar athrú anois agus graíméar nua do cheapadh agus an graiméar sin do chur i bhfeidhm sna scoíleanna agus iachall do chur ar na clódoirí agus ar na foilsitheoirí cloí leis an ngraiméar sin nuair a bheid ag cur amach leabhar scoile nó b'fhéidir leabhar eíle faoin nGúm nó faoin gClub Leabhar?

Is amaideach ar fad é, im thuairimse, an tslí atá tógtha chun an obair seo a chur chun cinn. An raibh aon tír riamh ann go raibh aon Rialtas nó aon Roinn Stáit nó Stát-Sheirbhíseach, nó lucht Parlaiminte nó Rí, a d'athraigh ar fad an teanga?

Tá saibhreas agus gontacht i gcaint na Gaeilge i gConnacht agus i gC ige Mumhan agus teastaíonn an saibhreas uainn. Tá an sampla ag an Aire agus tá sampla ag an Rialtas i dtaobh conas a tosuaíodh ar an obair cheana, nuair a Cuireadh Rannóg an Aistriúcháin ar bun ar dtús. Do ceapadh canúint, agus canúint a bhí go maith agus go ciallmhar, ach do glacadh comhairle cainteoirí Chúige Uladh agus Chúige Chonnacht agus ní raibh aon tsaibhreas ann ná raibh le fáil ag Rannóig an Aistriúcháin. Bhíodar i mbun obair na nAchtanna agus nuair a chuir siad isteach ar obair na scoileanna le himeacht aimsire, chuir siad feabhas ar chaint agus ar litriú na Gaeilge.

Nuair a ceapadh ar chanúint an Athar Peadar mar bhun chuige sin, bhí mórán déanta ar an Athaír Peadar roimhe sin. Is cuimhin liom nuair a thainig an tAthair Peadar go Baile Átha Clíath chun Saoirse na Cathrach d'fháil i 1926. Thug sé óráid uaidh i dTigh an Árd-Mhaoir ag cur síos ar conas mar thosnaigh sé ar scríbhneóiracht na Gaeilge agus an saghas litriú a bhí ann an uair sin. Chuir sé síos ar an údar agus mar a bhí an t-údar bruite síos ag an litriú, "Thosnaíos ar an ceann agus an t-earball a bhaint díobh agus an mullach a bhaint astu," dúirt sé. Agus sin mar d'éirigh leis an Athair Peadar ar chaighdeán nua na Gaeilge.

Is amaideach an obair atá ar siúl ag pé duine atá dá déanamh anois, bheith ag ceapadh graiméir nua agus á chlóbhualadh, gan cheist do chur in aon chor ar an Roinn Oídeachais. Is amaideach an rud é go dtabharfar ainm mar "Tóstal" nó ainm eile ar aon chuallacht Stáit gan an cheíst do chur faoi bhráid gléas éigin nó dream éigin a raibh dlúthbhaint aige leis an Roinn Oideachas agus obair na Gaeilge sna scoileanna.

Tá súil agam go dtuigeann an tAire conas atá an scéal fé láthair agus go gcuirfidh sé a chos síos agus go ndéanfaidh sé cosaint ar lucht na Gaeilge í dtaobh an ghraiméir nua seo. Agus ná déanadh sé cosaint ar lucht na Gaeilge agus ar an nGaeilge i dtaobh an Ghraiméir nuaidh seo. Tá a fhiosaige gur gá riaradh éigin a bheith ann agus go gcaithfear comh-réir ar chaint na leabhar a bheith ann, ach ní dóigh liom gur féidir, ná gur ceart é a dhéanamh gan an obair sin do chur faoí bhráid lucht na Roinne Oideachais, mar, cé gur maith an rud an obair seo go léir do bheith ar siúl, mura gcoimeádtar go buan agus go seasmhach agus go daingean an líofacht chainte agus an ghéire aigne agus an chinnteacht teangan atá ag muintir na Gaeltachta ní bheidh teanga náisiúnta agaínn agus, mar adeir an tAire arís:

"Níl ann ach an t-aon-teanga amháin gur linn féin í, go bhfuil ár ndúchas agus ár n-oidhreacht fite inti, a múnlaíodh ar intinn mhuintir na hÉireann agus gurb í fealsúnacht ár sinsir is anáil anama di; sí sin an Gaeilge."

Aon duine go bhfuil aon eolas aige agus go bhfuil aon staidéar déanta aige ar scríbhinní an Athar Peadar nó scríbhinní na n-údar is mó atá againn, tuigfidh sé sin nach ceart ligint do dhream nach bhfuil aithne ag aon duine againn orthu comhréir nua a cheapadh i gcóir na Gaeilge.

Tá fhios ag an Aire na constaicí agus na deacrachta atá ann faoi láthair i dtaobh leabhar do chlóbhualadh, go mór mór leabhair do cheapadh agus do chur sna scoileanna toisc an t-atharú ar an litriú. Is dóigh liom gurb é, do réir stíl scribhneoireachta. gurb é an tAthair Peadar an duine is fearr sompla, dá a lán againn, Muinhnígh, nó Connachtaigh nó muintir Chúige Uladh. Scríobh sé roinnt leabhar díreach agus roinnt leabhair eile agus na leabhair is mó a bhí ar eolas againne ag fás suas agus ag foghlaim na Gaeilge, níl siad le fail anois. Ní bhfuighfeá aon chóip de Sheanmóir Is Trí Fichid,scéalta as an mBíobla Naofa, tá timpeall 300 ann i gcóir uimhir a 1. Ní fheadar an bhfuil 30 cóipeanna ann de uimhir a 2; ní dóigh liom go bhfuil aon cheann de uimhir a 3 le fáil. Ní féidir iad do cheannach. Is dóigh nach bhfuil ach 30 coipeanna deAithris ar Chriostle fáil gidh gur ard-leabhar é sin agus níl aon fhonn in aon chorar na clódóirí na leabhair sin do chlóbhualadh arís. Is mór an chailliúint é sin do na daoine óga faoi láthair. Nach ait an scéal é sin, na leabhair is mó do thaithnígh linne ag fás suas, ag foghlaim na Gaeilge agus na leabhair do dhein taithint orainn leanúint leis an nGaeilge d'fhoghluim níl siad san le fáil ag ár ndaoine óga. Tá siad á fagháil ag daoine a bhí glic agus a chonac go rabh na leabhair sin ag dul as cló. Is é mo thuairimse gur cúram mór ar an Aire féachaint chuige sin agus má thagann graiméar nua isteach ar an obair sin éireoidh na clódóirí as clódóireacht Gaeilge ar fad. Tá súil agam go bhfuil sé ar chumas an Aire a rá, linn nach bhfuil an scéal chomh dorcha agus a mheasaimid é do bheith. Tá sé dorcha go leor nuair a chuimhnimíd ar an tslí inar deineadh an caighdeán nua eile.

So much with regard to the language. With regard to the general position, the Minister rightly says how much our nationality and our philosophy are enshrined in the language. We all know that. It is quite clear. I feel that a lot more should be known about the work that is being done in the schools, magnificent as it is. A little of it is being brought out into the open by our feiseanna and I would like to see a greater appreciation of what our feiseanna mean as a matter of adult education in both the language and in national culture and literature. I would like to see a little more general appreciation of that.

Deputy Desmond asks how is it possible that Irish should be used officially for descriptive purposes without the Department of Education having anything to say on it. In the same way, how is it possible for us to talk so much about what the language means to the country and to have no machinery of any kind for reviewing or for estimating the condition in which the language is in the Irish-speaking districts, for estimating and for positively putting down what are the things that are militating against its strength there, what are the things that, on the other hand, are helping it and what are the things that would help it more?

I would look to the annual statement of the Minister for Education for a review of the position of the language in the life of our people in the Irish-speaking districts. A separate inspectorate for the Gaeltacht was set up and from the reports that were originally made and that, no doubt, are continuing to be made from these Gaeltacht areas on the general conditions in the Gaeltacht as affecting the use of the language in ordinary life there must be a very fair amount of information and a very fair amount of suggestion now and it ought to be regarded as a responsibility of the Department of Education to give an annual summary of what the position in these Gaeltacht districts is. I would like to hear if the Minister is in a position readily to give the information. I would like to know to what extent, in the Donegal, in the Connacht and in the rather scattered Munster Gaeltacht, additional schools have been added to the inspectorate or if schools have been taken away. It would be interesting to know, from the point of view of size, how the inspectorate has been changed. I would hope that it might be possible for the Minister, in a systematic way, if not now, at any rate, in some kind of arranged way, to give us a statement, from the point of view of the people best able to have a point of view in the matter, as to what is the position of the language as the linguistic medium of life in the Irish-speaking districts. I feel that unless we settle on some machinery for keeping the situation there under review, the Gaeltacht will pass as some people say it is already passing.

I would like to mention Irish music. Deputy Desmond has been speaking of music generally but I would speak of that particular section of music that Father Séamus Ó Floinn has been lecturing on in our summer courses for the last three years or so. Has anything been done to have a systematic gramophone recording, particularly for purchase by the public, of the systematised review of Irish traditional music that Father Ó Floinn has been putting before the public through his splendid classes in Passage West andthrough the Summer School of Music? For a very long time Father Ó Floinn has interested himself in traditional music. For a very long time he has been tinkering with every kind of machine he could lay his hands on to record faithfully and systematically our Irish traditional airs.

When Colonel Brase came over here first, I had occasion to introduce him to many Irish traditional singers. The colonel rather went off the handle from time to time, because when he got to the piano and tried to reproduce what the singer had sung his attitude was, "But that is different." We cannot afford to have the remnants of Irish traditional music become simply a matter for argument and for criticism. At any rate, we have one splendid authority on the matter now and we have had a splendid amount of systematic work done. With all the wire recorders and all the machinery available for record purposes now, surely the whole of Father Ó Floinn's review of our Irish traditional music should be systematically recorded and made available for teachers to reproduce, say, on a gramophone for the teaching of their classes. When they attend a class of Father Ó Floinn's in the summer school, there seems to be no explanation as to why the teachers cannot buy here in town whatever records they want as samples. At this particular stage, there is no reason why a lecturer on these matters would not be able to produce records of the systematic story and setting out of the various Irish modes and the songs that emphasise them. I understand that it was proposed to develop that matter and I want to urge on the Minister that there is no time to be lost. Father Ó Floinn is too long on the road now to risk not having faithfully recorded under his direction the full range of his review.

The Minister indicated that the Council of Education is at present engaged in preparing its report, which will deal with the function of the primary school and the curriculum up to 12 years of age. It will be a very important thing to get. In the meantime there are some fundamental matters in regard to which waiting forthe report may be used by the Treasury to delay expenditure. One thing I should like to press on the Minister is the inadequacy of training college facilities, particularly for the training of women teachers but to some extent for male teachers. I know that two years ago there was grave urgency in regard to the matter of providing more facilities for the training of women teachers. In the meantime there has developed further criticism of the Department in connection with the number of untrained teachers who are being appointed throughout the country. I know that there is a demand from the primary teachers' organisation and others with regard to the training of teachers— that primary teachers should be the product of the university. I think it is realised that up to 11 years is the basic age for the imparting of primary education. What will come after that we will be better able to decide when we have an opportunity of considering the report of the Council of Education.

It is no doubt a good thing that our teachers should have a high ideal as to what the professional qualifications should be for teachers, including primary teachers. To my mind, however, one thing stands out in our whole educational machinery: that the only systematic training in teaching as a practice and as a profession is given in the training colleges in which primary teachers are trained. When you review the various classes of schools that teach children up to 12 years of age, then the work of these training colleges stands out as a work of fundamental importance that the educational authorities can hardly tinker with, and any development in the further education and the further training of teachers must be based on that work. At any rate, at the present moment to depart in any way from or surrender in any way, in the training of our teachers, the basic institutions which you have is absolutely unthinkable. That being so, there is an urgent need as far as I understand the situation that facilities should be available for the training of perhaps another 100 women teachers every year. That needwas there for some years past and every year that passes is adding to the problem that we have of putting untrained teachers into our primary schools. It is quite easy to see here and there throughout the country what the result is of having untrained teachers teaching young children. I am sure the Minister fully appreciates it, and I want again to press that it is a most urgent matter. I should like to ask the Minister how far he has progressed in the matter of dealing with that. It particularly applies to the women teachers, but the question also arises in regard to the men.

While we are on that, there is another aspect of the matter which, I think, would require attention. If the Minister looks at the Report of the Department of Education for the year 1948-49, page 5, he will see the results of the intermediate and leaving certificate examinations in regard to the preparatory colleges. I feel there must be something wrong or, at any rate, something that requires examination or requires to be looked into when you consider the great discrepancy that exists in respect of the results between the number of boys who got honours and the number of girls. I think the Minister will find that whereas only 55 per cent. of the boys from the preparatory colleges got honours in the leaving certificate examination 86 per cent. of the girls got them. In regard to individual subjects 25 per cent. of the boys got honours in English but 50 per cent. of the girls got honours. When you come down to geography, 50 per cent. of the boys got honours but 86 per cent. of the girls got honours. In regard to mathematics the boys are the only ones who got honours but even in this respect only five out of 26 boys got honours in the leaving certificate examination for the preparatory colleges. When you consider that these are sound subjects for teachers and that these are people who have gone into the preparatory colleges through competitive examination there seems to be some kind of weakness there but the discrepancy between the type of result got from the boys and that from the girls is really very striking. It looks as if there wassomething there that should be rather carefully investigated.

Another thing which I regard as fundamental from many aspects is harmony between the teachers and the Department. I am sorry to see that the Minister, whatever the cause, finds himself in the position he is in with regard to arbitration for the primary teachers. I understand that the arbitration scheme originally set up for the primary teachers gave great satisfaction to the teachers and to everybody connected with the Department. There was a serious clash between the Government and the teachers with a strike of teachers in 1946. With the passage of time and with the discussions that led to the setting up of arbitration machinery and its working, agreement was secured at conciliation level between the teachers, the Department and the Department of Finance. Yet, under the plea that the scheme of arbitration was to be reviewed at the end of 12 months, the scheme was stopped and a complete review of the situation from a different point of view entirely undertaken. Let us consider some of the things that the teachers are put up against now. In the first place:—

"In the original scheme it was permissible for the I.N.T.O., should they consider that course desirable, to make direct approach to the Minister on the question of salary. In the scheme now proposed the I.N.T.O. are precluded from so doing and matters within the scope of the scheme will in future be dealt with exclusively through the machinery of the scheme."

What is the necessity of denying representatives of the teachers the power of coming and sitting down with the Minister and having a face to face chat on things they think they want and things they feel they want to propose, if necessary, as matters that should be sent to conciliation and arbitration? Surely, in the kind of world we have to-day where it is most desirable that men, whatever their functions, should dovetail and work with one another, it is desirable that there would be no denying them anopportunity of discussing with the Minister a matter which was regarded as so important as to warrant setting up systematic machinery for dealing with it. It could easily be that direct access to the Minister would help to get a point of view put over that would take the edge off irritations, widen the field of view and help to prepare the minds of people to go in a constructive way into conciliation and arbitration machinery. I regard it as an unhappy thing to require that, where certain things have to be arranged for through conciliation and arbitration, the very fact of doing so should erect a barrier between the Minister and the people for whom the machinery was provided.

The second point suggested is:—

"If, at any time, during the period up to 30th June, 1954, legal proceedings on a matter coming within the scope of the scheme are instituted by any teachers or group of teachers and are pending, then, unless the I.N.T.O. has assured the Ministers that the organisation is not in any way supporting such proceedings nor associated with them, no meeting of the conciliation council or of the arbitration board shall be held," etc.

I understand that what is preventing the continuing of conciliation—the scheme ought to have been a continuing scheme and was meant to be a continuing scheme—arises over a case in connection with the change of rates in 1946. The I.N.T.O. are supporting the taking of legal proceedings by some members of the organisation and the Government is so outraged by that type of indiscipline, that the people should be invoking the law, that they decline to consider or discuss the settling of conciliation and arbitration machinery.

Surely even on a matter arising out of present-day conditions, and even arising on a matter which is liable to arbitration and conciliation, when something is done by which individuals feel that they are being affected unjustly to the extent of an illegality, it is unreasonable and undesirable that a Government should attempt to deny them the right of appeal to the courts. I submit to the Minister that that is only introducing unnecessary frictions and putting unnecessary obstacles inthe way of having harmonious relations of a sufficient satisfactory and working type between the Government and the teachers.

Again, it is stated:—

"If at any time during the period up to 30th June, 1954, the I.N.T.O. sponsor or resort to any form of public agitation as a means of furthering claims or seeking redress for grievances relating to matters within the scope of the conciliation and arbitration machinery, this agreement shall be terminated by the Ministers. Public agitation regarding matters within the scope of the conciliation and arbitration machinery is defined as follows:—

(a) Strike action or any measures to encourage or incite to strike action or directed towards the taking of strike action.

(b) Public meetings.

(c) Meetings of national teachers to which the Press was admitted or of which reports were supplied to the Press.

(d) Endeavours to enlist the support of trade unions or other outside organisations or of political Parties or individual members or groups of members of the Oireachtas.

The Ministers do not regard the annual congress of the I.N.T.O. as being prima faciea meeting for the purpose of furthering particular claims or seeking redress for particular grievances, and they do not propose that normally the clause should apply to it, even when it is held in the presence of the Press, or reports of its proceedings are supplied to the Press. The applicability or otherwise of the clause to congress would, however, depend on the general trend of the discussions thereat.”

Well, did anybody ever hear the like? In order to introduce a simple kind of working machine, you have to go back to all kinds of almost star chamber regulations like that. The general trend of the discussion at theIrish National Teachers' Annual Congress is likely to cause this arbitration scheme that is contemplated to be set aside.

Paragraph (5) states:—

"Representations from any outside organisation on behalf of serving teachers in national schools will not be entertained and, accordingly, the I.N.T.O. will not move any such body to make representations on behalf of serving teachers in national schools."

It seems to me that that paragraph would preclude the national teachers from having discussion with the managers of the national schools and getting the managers of national schools interested in whether their employees— the teachers—were being adequately paid.

If you are approaching the making of a working arrangement, what is the use of binding both the managers and the teachers by some kind of regulation such as that?

Paragraph (6) states:—

"Where the teachers bring forward for discussion a claim which, if conceded, would involve extra expenditure, they will give an estimate of the annual cost of conceding the claim, and will indicate the estimated ultimate annual cost where this differs from the estimated immediate annual cost."

Surely, if machinery is required for conciliation and arbitration between any body such as the teachers and the Department with which they are so closely associated, the agreement for setting up a conciliation scheme arises out of definitely understood facts? Surely the machinery for setting up a conciliation group, where the various teachers and the Department of Education and the Department of Finance are represented, is the means for bringing forward matters of that particular kind? It seems to me that a delaying action is being carried on against the teachers' organisation where it was perfectly demonstrated that a conciliation and arbitration scheme could work effectively, amicably and constructively if it was entered without any restrictions but with representatives of the teachers, of the Minister for Financeand of the Minister for Education, sitting down at a table and putting all their cards on it and coming to decisions at conciliation level as they did or otherwise coming to decisions at an arbitration level. The Minister, I am quite sure, would do his very best to keep out of an absurd tangle of that kind. However, other members of the Government find it very desirable to emphasise the principle of collective responsibility. I think the Minister cannot shed responsibility for the present hold-up. I should like to excuse him as much as possible. I want to say how much I feel and appreciate the fact that, in spite of the trouble that is going on over this, the Minister and the Department appear to be working in the greatest possible harmony and co-operation with the teachers. These matters are of an irritating kind and drag over a long period. It would have appeared impossible that primary teachers in Dublin would go out on strike. Yet, they did, in 1946. I am quite sure we will never reach that particular point again. However, under the stress of present economic conditions, and so on, you never know where, in an atmosphere of irritation, things might go.

I would press on the Minister and on the Government, that, in arranging an arbitration scheme with the primary teachers, they should not be denied access to the Minister. It can easily be a very mollifying affair although it might come hard on the Minister. Secondly, they should not require that the teachers would surrender legal rights or that the organisation would be required to disown teachers demanding their legal rights. I do not think it is necessary to put down in regulations the extent to which there may or may not be agitation of a particular kind, including agitation at an annual congress, regarding such matters as conditions of service, and so on. I do not think that is a matter for regulation. If there is the intention to work the machinery of conciliation and arbitration, that intention should be quite sufficient to damp down any agitation or any publication of any aspects of the difficulties that were unreasonable or were irritating. To require, say,that primary school managers would be formally and by regulation denied an opportunity of appealing or making representations on behalf of teachers is, I think, a very grave absurdity. The regulations suggested are regulations for delaying action more than anything else.

I sincerely hope that the Minister will be able to overcome his difficulties in the matter and to establish immediately, even as from 30th June, 1953, the conciliation and arbitration machinery without so many qualifications as to the spirit in which people will enter it. What is required is a clear intention and a spirit that these matters will be examined with the most scrupulous looking at facts of every kind and a situation in which the machinery can be used without being tied up in all kinds of irritating tape. I understand that a scheme of arbitration and conciliation has been arranged with the secondary teachers and I should like to know whether there is a clear understanding that the scheme, if it has been arranged, is a continuing scheme and that it will not be held up in 12 months' time when somebody thinks of another kind of regulation which could hold up any inquiry which requires to be made for a particular period or until some particular budgetary period comes along. I should like to know also what is the position with regard to the vocational teachers and the possibility of a similar scheme being brought in for them?

The Minister indicated that he had made the suggestion that a half-day a week should be set aside for some particular study, according to the wishes of the local teacher or manager. I want to commend the Minister's suggestion in that regard. I did not understand that the Minister had already given authority to have it brought into operation. He said he was waiting to see what kind of approval or otherwise would come to him with regard to it, but I suggest that he need not wait for any comment on it. I think he will find it a most useful and fruitful experiment. There are very many qualities and talents in our people and there are all kinds of special local interests.

Even in matters such as turf-cutting the county council turf-cutting schemes in Mayo and Galway had to be organised on entirely different lines. There are varying local interests and local traditions. It may be a tradition of the locality or a tradition of the teacher, but the Minister will find that the operation, even in a small number of places, of this voluntary period in the day would open the door to a very considerable amount of progress in the kind of education the people are looking for. People say that they want more direct education in certain schools and we all know how necessary it is to have the basic work done but more and more it is being realised, particularly in the home, that the development of character and of satisfaction in life depends, if not upon some definite skill in craftwork of one kind or another, upon some definite interest that keeps the mind active and keeps possibly the hand active, too. I strongly recommend to the Minister to go ahead with this idea.

I wonder if the Minister has any suggestions he could make with regard to the staffing of small out-of-the-way schools. I want to suggest, and to suggest it with regard to the Irish-speaking districts, that where there are small one-teacher schools, something might be done to develop among the senior pupils, in a small and almost semi-voluntary kind of way, the monitorial idea. It ought to be possible to strengthen the work in the small schools in Irish-speaking districts by helping a few of the older girls or boys to take charge of some of the classes for a number of hours a week and perhaps to give them a summer course in some aspects of teaching work. There is a rather important situation that has to be guarded in that connection. It would be disastrous if any more of our small schools were shut down because to take a school, however small, from an out-of-the-way district—it is like taking the straw off the rocks—is to break the spirit in our people and to bring about a position in which there will be no children there at all.

I should like to know from the Minister also if he is satisfied that he ismaking adequate preparation for the training of teachers for vocational schools. There is, as he shows in his statement, very fruitful contact between our vocational schools and the voluntary educational societies which are developing in the country, such as Macra na Feirme, the Irish Countrywomen's Association, and Muintir na Tíre. A new life is coming into these organisations, together with new confidence and much greater energy, by reason of the fact that there is a contact between them and the vocational committees and teachers, a contact which has been established for some time.

There is one aspect of that contact, however, to which I want to refer. I do not know whether the Minister has come up against it or not. In many cases, the vocational teachers give voluntary assistance to these societies. They visit their clubs and the homes and give classes and instruction there. I have heard of at least one vocational body that has intervened to prevent its teachers giving, although in a voluntary way, systematic courses of instruction for bodies such as these. It would be a pity if the vocational teacher who is prepared in her own time to give a course of six or 12 classes in cooking, needlework or other domestic work of that kind at a club of the Irish Countrywomen's Association or in their homes, should be prevented from doing so because there is an agenda for the work. That would be very undesirable in view of the difficulty of getting vocational buildings erected as quickly as we would desire.

The Minister has seen where, in Coachford, the local people have provided their own schools and he mentioned also schools which are being voluntarily provided in County Waterford and in Donegal. There is that effort amongst people to prepare buildings and accommodation for the vocational education branch for the provision of organised courses. However, it would be very bad to interfere with or kill a course that was being done in a voluntary way and was being done in co-operation with these organisedsocieties that have done so much to make our people understand the value of education.

Deputy Desmond spoke of the position in regard to scholarships from primary to secondary schools or to the universities; in any event there is a very serious discrepancy between the amount of a scholarship which is given to one county and that which is given to another. I would like to suggest to the Minister that it would be very desirable to have that general matter discussed with representatives of the General Council of County Councils. They have an understanding of the situation. They have a certain number of representatives on the university bodies and they can quite easily find out full particulars as to what it costs to send a young person through a university course. Whether a person comes from Leitrim or Cork, the university costs are very much the same. They might be more costly for a person coming from Leitrim than for a person coming from Cork because the Cork student might be living at home and might not have the expense of lodgings, and so on. I think the question of primary scholarships to secondary schools, and particularly that of secondary scholarships to the university, are matters which the Minister could very well have discussed with the General Council of County Councils.

The Minister mentions certain things which have developed in the National Library and in the National Gallery. I would like the Minister to know that I met a number of people down the country who very much appreciate some of the photostatic assistance that has been given to them from the National Library. I would also like to commend the work that has been done there on the micro-filming of our national documents, of which there has been a most interesting display in the Library quite recently. I have heard that praised very much from rather unexpected people who are able to make use of it.

I would like the Minister to know also that the lectures which have been given on the paintings in the National Gallery, and which he says haveattracted a greater audience than he thought they might, have been very much welcomed, and the quality of the instruction and the review that is given there has been very much appreciated.

Mr. Cunningham

I should like to say a few words on the method of recruitment to the teaching profession. The present system means that about 80 per cent. of our teachers are recruited through the preparatory colleges. While I agree that that particular method is all right—we do get the best brains in the country at the age of 14— my point is that each year 60 boys and a similar number of girls are taken into the preparatory colleges and spend four years there; eventually, at the end of the course, the take the leaving certificate. Due again to the good instruction given and the different facilities offered by the preparatory colleges, they all invariably pass that examination and thereby qualify to enter the training college. I think that at the age of 14, when these boys and girls are taken into the preparatory colleges, they are not in a position to decide whether or not they would like teaching as a career. Actually they become teachers by accident. Because it is a good scholarship pupils do avail of it, especially in the western areas where Irish is the spoken language, and they enter the preparatory colleges. It does give a chance to those students to obtain the leaving certificate but having gained it they should then be given the option of deciding whether or not they wish to become teachers. It is only at that age, say, 18, 19 or 20, that these young people can really make up their own minds in that regard. It is a pity to see young boys who have a bent for engineering or some other profession being pushed against their will into teaching. After all, teaching is a vocation. As one inspector remarked: "Teachers are born, not made." It is not a good principle to take, at the age of 14, 120 pupils per year into the preparatory colleges to train as teachers. We know from experience that about 99 per cent. of them qualify as teachers.

Some chance should be given to thosestudents at the age of 18 or 19, when they do the leaving certificate examination, to decide for or against teaching as a profession. There are snags in the way. If any individual decides not to go forward as a teacher he is asked there and then to pay up fairly large sums of money to the State. As his parents may not be in a position to do that the result is that he must go into the training college and become a teacher. For that reason, I feel we are getting people into the teaching profession who would prefer and would be better in other professions.

Some time ago I put down a question to the Minister to find out how many trained teachers left the profession other than by death or retirement at pension age, and I discovered that the numbers were fairly large. I figured it out and if I am correct, I think about 15 per cent. of the boys who are trained leave the teaching profession; that is, the figure 69, which I think it was over the last five years, works out at about 13 per year, which would be about one-fifth of the boys in the training college. If it is true that one-fifth of the teachers who are trained leave the profession, there must be something wrong. I think one of the reasons for the exodus of qualified teachers from the profession is that there are greater enticements by way of salary, working conditions, and so on, in other professions for which they are qualified. That is, to my mind, the cause for these people leaving, giving up teaching as a profession. We know that teachers are not paid as high as members of other professions who have similar qualifications, and one cannot blame them if, when they find themselves qualified to undertake other work, that they desert teaching as a means of earning a livelihood.

There is another important matter which affects the Gaeltacht areas and that is school meals. I find in many parts of my constituency where schools are situated in Gaeltacht areas, that they do not come under the School Meals Act of 1930 and—I have mentioned this before—I think the schedule to that Act should be amended in order to bring in schoolswhich are registered in the fíor-Gaeltacht areas. Take, for instance, Rosguill in County Donegal. It is a Gaeltacht and there is an Irish college there but the national school in that district does not have the benefit of school meals. It is the same with Glencar. It is a Gaeltacht area; the children are qualified for deontas—the £5 grant to Irish-speaking children. Yet, the pupils of that school have not the benefit of school meals, and I am sure there are other Gaeltacht schools in a similar position.

I noticed Deputy General Mulcahy mentioned the half-hour per day which would be available for the teachers to decide whether to give instructions of value to the pupils outside the programme. I find that the national school programme at the moment is very much overloaded. The Minister will appreciate that the teaching of two languages in a school—and in any school teaching ordinary school subjects through the medium of Irish— has overloaded the present programme, and the teachers do find that they are always trying to rush against time because the course in arithmetic, history, geography, oral and written Irish and English, is very wide; and in the rural, two-teacher schools. where each teacher is in charge of four or five classes, I cannot see him achieving much, or doing any useful work in the half-hour which will be at his disposal to use in some way that will be advantageous to the children.

I think that if a teacher decides to introduce some useful programme for the half-hour during which he is free to do what will benefit the children the ordinary programme should be cut down accordingly. Otherwise there will be still more cramming in the time that is available for the ordinary school subjects, when one steals this half-hour from them. If the Minister does make a regulation that teachers must use the half-hour per day and devote it to something which will be of local interest and which will be outside the school programme—if he makes that compulsory, I am afraid there will be many teachers in the country who will steal that half-hour and give it back to the humdrum teaching of tables andspellings, or something like that, which he has not enough time to do in the ordinary hours.

Again, while on the programme, I would like to back what Deputy Vivion de Valera said in connection with secondary schools. I think the same does apply to primary schools. The children there are trying to get a smattering of everything and they leave school with a general knowledge of history, geography, Irish, English, mathematics and so on. But one finds that when you meet them afterwards they are very indefinite when dealing with tables, simple mathematical or arithmetical problems or calculations: their handwriting is poor, their spelling is bad and I think more time should be devoted to handwriting, reading and the proper understanding of what the pupils read, and to tables, simple calculations and so on.

I think a child who is efficient or very efficient at those things will be capable after leaving school of assimilating and amassing knowledge, because we Irish people are inclined to be lackadaisical and we are not definite enough in our statements, in our knowledge, and the school programme should be aimed to enable a child to have definite knowledge in the principal subjects like Irish, English and arithmetic—both Irish written and oral, and English written and oral.

There is a shortage of qualified teachers at the moment and I suppose it is that which causes the Minister to mention the opening of a second training college fairly soon. Although there is a shortage at the moment I hope never again will we arrive at the position, say, of the 'thirties—from 1932 or so to 1939—where qualified teachers had to spend three or four years doing substitute work because there was a glut of teachers. Some of them went across to Scotland and England during those years and I know myself of many teachers who trained in those years and who had to wait for two or three or four years before they were able to find permanent employment in a school of theirown. That should be guarded against in any extension to the present training facilities.

In connection with the £5 grant given to families who live in the Gaeltacht and who use the Irish language every day in their homes, I think that facility should be extended to include families outside the Gaeltacht where Irish is in daily use. I find that Gaeltacht families who are given Land Commission holdings in Gálltacht areas continue to use Irish as the spoken language of the home, but they find that they are not given the £5 grant per child which was available to them in the Gaeltacht. I think that the grant should be given to those families in whose homes Irish is genuinely the spoken language of the father, mother and other members of the family.

In rural schools, especially in two-teacher schools, the history programme is divided into two parts—that is, the teacher in one year will teach the history from the earliest times to the Flight of the Earls, and in the following year will teach from that period to the present day. As a result of that arrangement I find that the period of modern history, from 1913 down—a very important period—is left to the end of the year and, in consequence, pupils in the national schools at the present time are given but a poor idea of the struggle for independence in this country. That happens because that period of history is done every second year and at the end of that long period. I would suggest that the period of modern history from 1913 should be done each year as a separate unit altogether and then the teacher could go back over whichever other period comes up for attention that year.

I think too, that our school readers both in Irish and English should contain the words of the National Anthem. We find at present that some pupils are not familiar with the words of the National Anthem. The Minister should not, I think, sanction any school reader, whether an Irish reader or an English reader, which does not contain the words of the Anthem. Finally may I say that I think the Minister has continuedthe work of the last Minister and has met the teachers' organisation very fairly? We are looking forward to happy relations between the Department and the teaching profession.

Mr. McQuillan

There is only one point I wish to raise on this Estimate and I hope that the Minister may be able to do something about it. I am informed by some of the teachers and some of the authorities responsible for secondary schools, that they are dissatisfied with the method adopted in the setting of examination papers for leaving certificates and inter. certificates. The criticism they have levelled is one with which I personally agree because it is not so long ago since I did the leaving certificate myself. At that time, I recollect definitely that in the various papers set for examination there was a choice of questions. I can recollect that there might be 12 questions on a particular paper and it would be unnecessary to do more than seven or eight of these questions. That left a choice to every student. The position at the moment is—and I have looked at some of these papers myself— that the choice has become very limited indeed. In some of the examination papers at the moment there is only a choice in regard to one extra question and in some cases there is no choice at all to the student.

I do not think the students have changed very much since my time and I recollect that one of the thrills a student had, on getting a particular paper, was to have a quick scan over all the questions, first of all, to see what choice he had and, secondly, to see which was the easiest to start. Mind you it made a considerable amount of difference to the student if he saw a choice of questions, could get down to work straight away and get over the ones about which he felt confident. That gave him a great feeling of confidence to tackle the remainder of the questions. That choice, as I say, has disappeared. There has been a complaint in particular of the method adopted in the present year. I think myself that in the past there was more scope for the individual bent ofstudents and a little more imagination displayed in the setting of papers. I cannot for the life of me understand why there is not that choice nowadays. Surely it is not a question of saving paper. I hope it is not.

I do not want to be too critical of the individual who set the papers but I should like if the views which other Deputies have on this matter, and which coincide with mine, were made known to the people responsible for the setting of these papers. The remarks I have made are really made on behalf of the students as well as the teachers. The Minister himself was young at one time. I am not going to suggest how long ago that is but, at any rate, I am sure he would have great sympathy with young boys and girls who sit for these examinations. Many of them are excited in sitting for the examinations and it is a great relief to them to be able to make a choice of the questions on the examination paper. All students are not alike. Some of them may find it much more difficult than others to face an examination although they may be equally as good and know their subjects equally as well, as students who can face an examination with great calm. That is the only point I want to raise on this Estimate and perhaps the Minister might have some comments to make with regard to it when concluding.

Captain Giles

This is one of the Estimates which deserve special attention because the whole life of the nation revolves around education. I am satisfied as a result of fairly long experience that education is making an advance and our people on the whole are as well educated as their counterparts in any other European country. That is a fact. When we come to review the position, however, we must ask ourselves: How fare our youth? Whither are we going? Are we moulding a national character and a national outlook? It is on character and outlook that we must concentrate. Why is it that after 30 years of native government we have not succeeded in framing national character? Something must obviously be wrong.

So far as the revival of the languageis concerned, I believe that the Minister, the teachers and the children in the schools are playing their part. But there is some lacuna somewhere and I believe that it occurs after the children leave school. Something will have to be done to remedy the present position in that respect. There is too great a pursuit of materialism and that pursuit of materialism militates against the resurgence of a national soul. So long as that pursuit continues, so long shall we remain without a national soul.

People are no longer content to live the simple lives they led in the past. Because our people were simple they were happy, and that is true of even the worst days under the British. The people knew what real happiness was because they had a proper sense of values. Nowadays, even the people in good positions, with good salaries, are no longer happy because they have lost that characteristic that brought their ancestors and their forebears through all kinds of trouble and through every manner of vicissitude.

I know the Minister knows that that is true. I know that, like his predecessor, Deputy Mulcahy, he wants to see the rebirth of the nation's soul and a resurgence of Irish culture and Irish thought. We will achieve nothing if we degenerate into a nation of shoneens. At the moment we bid fair to become a nation of snobs, prigs and shoneens. The problem is to dig out the roots of these now. There will be no use in calling ourselves a nation if we do not make any effort to build up a nation.

The money spent on education is spent to good advantage. I have had some experience of that myself. A family from my own county emigrated to England. Two of the children went to school in England and, after a fortnight in the particular school, they were required to sit for examination with their English colleagues. What was the result? The two of them headed the examination list. I need not tell you that we are very proud of that achievement in my part of the country. That is proof that our educational system must be as good certainly as the system obtaining in England.We must, however, do something more to stamp an Irish character on the nation as a whole. In order to do that I think we should concentrate on the children who leave school at 14 years of age because from 14 to 17 are three of the most formative years in the character of the child. Indeed the lacuna that exists can in some degree be attributed to the loss the nation sustains because of children leaving school at 14 years of age. They go into inferior positions. They are not able to express themselves properly. They are not able to think for themselves. The youth who speaks Irish and is sneered at by his colleagues promptly loses interest in the language. Getting rid of that inferiority complex may be difficult but an effort will have to be made to rectify the present position if we are really sincere in our desire to rehabilitate the nation.

Nowadays people's only desire seems to be to place their children in nice soft jobs. Every child is not a bright child and it is not every child who will fit in successfully into the job his parents pick for him. That is a matter that calls for some attention at the moment because the young people are rushing off to the cities, looking for jobs and the jobs must always be somewhat better than those held by a neighbour's children. If the race to Dublin ends in failure they go over to England. There is no necessity for them to emigrate because there is plenty of work to be found here. Having gone to England, they come home after a few months on holiday with their pockets filled with money and they are a disturbing influence in the lives of the young people who have remained at home. They will boast of all the money they have but they never mention the enormous income-tax liability that they have to meet. At the beginning of the holiday they have money to burn; at the end of the holiday they are as poor as when they first set out. The craze for emigration is growing gradually worse. It almost looks as if we will never be anything more than a shire of England. Until we eradicate that craze we will never get anywhere. Looking at the position to-day one is compelled to ask oneself: what was the good of all the sacrificeif our young people now go away so readily and, coming home for a holiday, tell us that life is not worth living here? That inferiority complex is doing enormous harm. It will have to be fought. We will have to mould the character of our children.

The man with the pledged word, the man of honour, the man of honesty is gone. Lies, deceit and fraud are rampant. Why that is so I do not know. We are spending plenty of money on education. The parents to-day are as good as those that went before them. Nevertheless there is something lacking. Building up the character and resuscitating the soul of a nation subject to tyranny for 700 years is, I admit, trojan work. The present position must be reviewed. We must discover if there is some other road we can travel to achieve our objects. We will have to instil into our people a spirit of self-sacrifice. That self-sacrifice must come right from the top all down through every grade in our society. In that way we will imbue our young people with a new spirit. Five years of such a policy must get results. That is the only way in which we will wipe out the snobbery and the shoneenism and bring the people together in the old simple way of life. We must have a definite aim. We must have a definite object. I am satisfied the Minister is the proper person to control the destinies of our youth. I am satisfied he will do his job successfully if he is allowed to implement his policy in his own way. He has shown his character in the past. He is showing it to-day and I am satisfied that he will show it to-morrow.

I think the Minister should have no difficulty in thinking out a simple programme of education. That is what we want. At the moment we have too much cramming. It is a fact that there are too many of our young people striving to engage in higher studies and to get to bigger and better schools. The fact, however, is that what we want for 80 per cent. of our children is not a higher school education but a good national school education. If our children get that from contented teachers, if they get a goodgrind in reading, writing and arithmetic, they will be able to do well for themselves when they leave the primary school. It is true that there are too many children, belonging to poor as well as to well-to-do parents, trying to get to the bigger type of school. They are rushing hither and thither: their parents are spending money on their education and at the end of it all they find that there is no scope for the employment of the education they have received. The result is that many of them are too proud to take work such as their parents are engaged on, and in the end they take the emigrant ship. We should get shut of that nonsense. If we do, then I suggest that life will be better for everyone.

I am of opinion that the school-leaving age should be raised from 14 to 16. It will be necessary for us to do that in order to correct the present position so far as education is concerned. We should be able to blend education and religion better than we are doing at the moment. In my opinion, far more of the time of the teachers should be devoted to religious instruction. I do not think half enough time is given to it at present. Religious instruction seems to end now when the children have received the Sacrament of Confirmation. As I say, we should have more religious teaching in our schools. More Christian Doctrine should be taught. The reading of the Bible should be part of the education given to the children. All that should go on until the children have reached the age of 15 or 16. At present, they do not know the first thing about what their aim in life should be. It should not be materialism and comfort, but rather a preparation for a better life in another world.

These are the things which are forgotten as far as education is concerned —the simple things in life which should be taught to the children. It is because they are not taught that our nation is drifting. No one can stop that drift unless we take the hard, honest road, face these facts and train our people to a simple way of life, train them to get away from all the highfalutin nonsense about materialism and comfort. Our aimshould be to try and develop a sense of character in our people. I admit that will be a hard job, due to the years of fighting and civil strife that we have had in this country, when in order to save our neighbours we had to tell lies. The result of that has been to make our youth a nation of liars. That went on for many years so that we might escape the tyranny that was grinding us. We must get away from all that. It will be a hard fight, but our people should now realise that they are a free people, and that we expect more from them than deceit and lies. Our aim should be to raise up a manly people, people of character, of high spirit and nobility of mind, ready to make sacrifices and to help others. I believe that if we were to concentrate on these things, in four or five years' time we would get good results.

I suggest that we cut out all this nonsense about looking for big things and talking about higher education and higher studies. We have some brainy people in our nation. They will always get to the top. Nothing can stop them, whether they are the sons of rich men or poor men. We all know of men who, after a few years of education, left this country and made their mark elsewhere because they had the ability that God gave them and they used it. There is no use in trying to cram education into the mind of the youth whose brain has not properly developed. I myself knew many boys who were a complete failure at school. They could hardly read or write or spell when leaving school at the age of 14, despite the fact that they had good teachers. Yet, in after life, they became men of balanced minds whose brains developed at a late age. Many of them became well-off men.

There is nothing of more importance in this country than the primary school. In my opinion there is not enough attention given to easing the position of the teachers in the primary schools. The result is that over a long number of years we have had a dissatisfied teaching profession. Until we take steps to remedy that position, we are not likely to get very far. In the past, many of our teachers had not more than £60 a year, and yet theydevoted their whole lives and energy to teaching the youth of the country. Teaching with them was a vocation in life. I want to see the teachers of the present day having that same vocation and showing the same spirit of self-sacrifice in the welfare of our youth. Unless we succeed in doing that, our teaching profession will not be anything more than a trade union. That is one of the most dangerous things that I see at present, that our teachers should have to band themselves together, that they should have to fight and maybe perhaps strike because we have failed them. If this House fails them, then we shall have done an enormous amount of damage to future generations of our people.

I hope, therefore, that the Minister will make every effort to satisfy the members of the teaching profession, that he will be able to make them contented men and women, with a salary sufficient to enable them and their families to live in reasonable comfort— so that they will be able to say publicly and openly through the headquarters of their organisation: "We are satisfied that an Irish Government is doing its best to improve our lot." Unless we reach that position we will not be able to get the education that we require for our youth. The teachers' salary crux should be cleared up once and for all by this or by some Government. There should be arbitration and conciliation. Peaceful methods should be used to bring about a happy position so far as the teaching profession is concerned. I think if an effort were made that position could be reached.

We all know very well that at the present time an ignoramus of any type can earn far more than a principal teacher. That is a thing that is upsetting members of the teaching profession. They are wedded to their present positions and cannot leave them. They can see any kind of a Tom, Dick or Harry who goes to England able to earn anything from £15 to £20 a week, while the teachers who helped to mould their characters have to be satisfied with perhaps £ a month or £10 a week. I hold that, next to our clergy, the most important people in this country are the teachers. Their positions are almost as importantas those of the teachers who are members of the religious orders. The moulding of the minds and the hearts of our youth is in their hands. If the members of the teaching profession are not contented they cannot do their work in the way they should. We all know that it is in their hands to make this a good or a bad nation. The salary trouble that has been brewing for a long number of years should have been eased long ago. The reason why we are not getting the results that we expect is because something has not been done to ease that position. On top of that we have too many bad schools. I certainly do not blame the previous Government or this Government, for they have been trying to build new schools, but I know that there is a good deal of leeway to make up yet. There are hundreds and hundreds of old shacks of schools, some of them over 120 years of age, which have been torn down and new edifices put in their places. But it takes more than the Government to do these things. We will have to see our managers and our Ministers of State and our teachers coming closer together and taking proper note, in the interests of a better type of community life for our people, of the need for more good schools in the country.

Anywhere you go you can see, as throughout the Midlands, fine new schools properly built and equipped being erected, where there is a contented teaching staff working in a happy school; but a few miles further on you will see an old shack perhaps over 120 years of age with rats coming up through the floors, and damp everywhere. It is humiliating and a disgrace after 30 years of native government and it is time that we spent millions of pounds—I do not care where it comes from—getting rid of those old shacks. You cannot expect a teacher to be contented when he sees a few miles away a lovely school in lovely surroundings with lovely outoffices and sanitation, and he has to come into an old shack with up to 70 or 80 children there together with steam-rising from their damp clothes and where they have no facilities, and to see that happeningyear after year. We should get shut of these old schools. We have spent millions and millions of pounds in other ways, badly spent money. If we spent those millions to give proper facilities in the schools we would get somewhere.

I know a good deal about teaching, because I am in the midst of it and because I mix a good deal with teachers, and I am satisfied that there is too much moving of teachers throughout the country. A new teacher may come from the South of Ireland and settle down in the Midlands, and find no facilities there. Often he is a married man with a young family growing up, and he finds that he has no home and no means of building one. Even where there is a new school there is no school house there for the teacher. There should be an effort made, where a new school is built, to have at least a school house or two for the principal teachers in that school. There is no reason why we should not do it. We build houses for Civic Guards and we make no provision whatever for national teachers although we must agree that they are the foremost persons in the land or in the parish. They have to do everything for the community life there, be the secretary of this and the secretary of that, and we expect them after school hours to go out and start reviving the Gaelic League, starting feiseanna and all that, and they go home and have no house or roof over their own heads. It is time that we had an Irish outlook and saw that where we built school houses we would build also good teachers' residences. They are entitled to that.

A new teacher may stay in such a place for a few years, but then we find him searching for advertisements in the papers and answering them and going to the big towns and cities because facilities are there for the education of their children and they can get a home over their heads. Unless we tackle these things you will find that we will have only third- or fourth-rate teaching in the country areas and people leaving for the cities for the good things of life. Let the good things of life be given to the people in the country areas, because every honestIrishman knows that the cities have nothing more than you can find in England, France and continental countries and that everything that is really good comes from the country areas, where people are living in communion with the Almighty Himself out in the green fields. I have seen some teachers in country areas spending whole weeks there trying to find, not alone a house but a room for shelter, and they cannot get it; and many of them have to take the next opportunity of getting away. They should not be put in this humiliating position of having been educated and giving of their best to carry on their profession in an honourable way and yet being unable to find even a shack to come to. I think we ought to study this seriously and see where we stand.

With regard to examinations, there is too much cramming and concentration on getting results. Whether it is the national schools or the convent schools or any other type, the children are being crammed there to get results, and if they do not get them they are afraid of their lives, worried and troubled by what So-and-so will think about them "if you don't win to-morrow". You find the bigger schools publishing in the local papers the results they got, and another school will come along with its successes. The effect is that the poor kids come to the ground and their nerves are racked. I do not believe we want them to concentrate on examinations and results. What you want to bring out is a balanced man or woman with a true vocation in life, and let them be content with the small things. Do not be risking their health and spending enormous amounts of money from their parents' pockets for examination results when often you find that the money is money thrown away and the children are left with nothing to look to only the emigrant ship. We ought to be content with the simple things. Let them have an ordinary simple, decent education. We are training them for Ireland and not for export abroad, and for the future generation of the Irish nation built on the simple Irish way of life, and we should get rid of this highfalutin nonsense, because it is nothing more.

I saw some men myself who were educated in Oxford come home to Ireland and try to settle down, but they never could settle down because they were too highly educated—highly cultured, lovely people to speak to, but they were complete failures, and they were the greatest sources of trouble in any area I ever came into because they were too big for their boots and they could not stand down. These things go to show that the education that really matters is built on simple things, trying to turn out a balanced man, who can be a cultured man. In this country over the last 30 or 35 years we had the Irish Volunteers. Did they spring from the higher schools, the academies and all that? No, they sprang from the ordinary national school, 90 per cent. of them, and they got no further, but they moulded the destinies of this country in their own way and made a success of it. Ought that not be a headline for the whole lot of us? We ought to follow it with strict attention because this country is just as good in the matter of education as any other in Europe and indeed far beyond some of them, because from what I read of some countries they are very primitive. We ought to be proud of that fact. We have a good balanced people, and they are educated enough to hold their own with the best elsewhere.

In connection with vocational education, I am satisfied that it is making a reasonable drive in the last eight or ten years. There was a time when it was in its infancy and it was in a weak condition. You could not get people to go to vocational schools then, but they are all crammed and filled up now by the people, as they realise that results are being got there. There is, however, too much concentration on the big school in big centres, which is upsetting the people in the country areas. They have to go to the big centre and there they get the new outlook and the new ideas and you never get them back to the country. We will have to concentrate more on putting an additional class room to the national schools, no matter what the cost. It will be worth it, so as to get a balanced nation. Attached to the national school should be a centre forthe vocational school, teaching cookery, dressmaking, carpentry and so on. We should let the people learn to fend for themselves in their own homes.

There should never be any necessity for a farmer in a country area to have to hire a carpenter, a contractor or even an engineer. Every farmer should be able to do his own work. Not that I am bragging or boasting, but I never allow in either the one or the other. I do all the work myself and could not have done it had it not been that I went to those schools in my young days and made good use of them and when I left off I was able to see the road ahead and go along it. I was able to build my own houses and do my own engineering, yet I am only an ordinary type of person. I do not see why every farmer should not do these things for himself, instead of going to the State for this, that and the other. We have little State grants for this and that and at the end of the year we are growling that the taxation has gone up. We want none of these State sops, if we are to educate our people to be balanced men, able to work for themselves and in the interests of the country. It would save millions of pounds if we turned out the right type of people.

The primary teacher should not have to continue on a smaller salary than the vocational teacher. Primary education is the centre and the chief pivot and the national teacher should be the highest paid in the land, but he is not. Vocational teachers at a certain age have a higher salary than primary teachers. That is wrong, as the primary teacher is the pivot of the whole machinery. Until his salary is brought up to the level of the vocational teacher his troubles will not be eased.

There is another thing I do not like in the revival spirit in connection with the feiseanna. Many vocational teachers have to rush into that field and work up these feiseanna, not for the purpose of the revival or for an Irish Ireland but to put in teaching hours so that they can get better salaries. That is a shocking spirit. I give them every credit for going outin the open and working to spread these cultures, but I do not like materialism where there should be a spirit of self-sacrifice. When you have these teachers working to get a stipend it is wrong and it is killing everything. You find the feis platform packed with vocational teachers of all types. They take over centres and use them, not so much for the furtherance of the language as in order to make their salary go a little further. That is a wrong spirit and a rotten spirit. All honour to those who are doing that work: if they were content and had proper teaching hours they would do it for the sake of resurrecting the culture, without any charge, in that spirit of self-sacrifice.

There are people who made trojan sacrifices, who will still and would, only that they are shoved to one side by this group of people who try to get their salaries up by putting in special hours in this way. That shocking position should be ended, otherwise we will get no private enterprise or private effort from our people. In our young days there was hardly a parish, let alone a county, that had not some Irish Ireland revival, some method of reviving the language and the culture. A man would get up on a crock of a bicycle, with perhaps no tyres, and go 40 miles to help a feis and would ride back in the middle of the night with not even a lamp. Now you would not get a man to go in a Rolls Royce 20 miles unless there was some big carnival where he could have a royal time. That spirit must change and it can be changed.

I believe in self-sacrifice and in the spirit of the people, reviving these things in their own little areas. Let every parish be the pivot of activity to interest the people at home, to get them work and to make them able to speak the Irish language and proud to speak it, at the crossroads, in the schoolroom and outside the chapel gate. Let them be proud to do it in the face of those who sneer at it. But they are too weak and not able to do it and they have no lead from the top. I, myself, believe the Irish language can be revived and will be revived and should be revived and that an effortshould be made by the whole lot of us. We must kill shoneenism and priggishness all over the country which sneers at the efforts of the people. Why should we not have our language? Germany has her language, Belgium has her language, Holland has her language, Britain has her language. Why should we not have ours? Surely we are not a set of shoneens after 30 years; surely we will make some advance, that we may see the day when this will be an Irish speaking nation and we will be proud of it. There is no reason why we should not be able to step, four square, the whole nation, to see that it is revived and revived in a manly Irish spirit, not by flying in the teeth of someone else but by bringing the people along with us, saying at the top that we are in earnest. I believe that there is no such thing as earnestness at the top. We have a few glib words every year and a few openings of feiseanna by Ministers or chief men. But there is no effort being made; it is all linked up with political ballyhoo and that is what has us where we are to-day. We should get away from that. There will be very little progress until we let the people see we are sincere, that any money spent is well spent, that we are making an honest effort and not just trying to slip politics across someone else. We must get that out to the people and then we will get somewhere.

The Minister is a man I am glad to see as Minister for Education. He sprang from the people, when they wanted him he was there, and his spirit and outlook are the same as 20 years ago. His predecessor, Deputy Mulcahy, was the same. I was proud to see that type of man with the destinies of Irish education in his hands. It is in proper hands and in keeping with the spirit of the men who went before us. If there had been a little more realism and sincerity and a more open approach to the many problems holding back this nation, we would have got better results. We will not get them while we keep going as we are, with a discontented teaching profession, with national schools that are a public disgrace, with shoneenism bleeding the country white of its people, with boys and girls of 14 and15 going out of the country while there could be plenty of work for every one of them in their own country areas where they could marry and settle down and build more houses. We are allowing that drift because we are on different sides of this House, but I say the whole lot of us will come to the ground if we do not realise the responsibility that is placed on our shoulders by the living and the dead to carry on an Irish nation that everyone could be proud of. We are adopting the slippery game, and if we keep going on as we are, people will rise up and curse the very name of the living generation, because we have sold the people. The day is ripe for a complete review of our problems, to see if we are training our children to be future citizens of this country or if we are training them for another country. I will not say any more, though there is plenty I could say. We live in the midst of drift, not to the land but from the land, and that is directly caused by our own shoneenism.

Mr. Calleary

I wish to avail of this opportunity to bring under the Minister's notice that a number of schools in my area in North Mayo are in a very bad condition. Deputy Browne, speaking in this debate last week, mentioned Callow and Straide, but I know some schools that are worse. Last October I had a discussion with the Minister and some of his officials, but so far I regret to say that not one of the schools I mentioned has been repaired. This is unworthy. The winter will be coming on again and nothing is being done with these schools. It is a sad state of affairs that teachers and pupils are compelled to spend their days in insanitary schools. I hope the Minister will try to remedy this state of affairs. Some of these schools have to be replaced. I know of schools that were supposed to be replaced for the last five years. There is one school, Treanbeg, that was examined two or three years ago. New sites were examined. I have been told that they are going back to the first site that was examined.

In some cases new schools are required owing to the increase in thenumber of school-going children. No matter how I try, I can get nothing done about providing the new schools. I hope the Minister will insist that good school accommodation will be provided. Areas where new schools are required include: Doohoma, Muingingan, Treanbeg, Sheeaun.

I come now to a question that worries us considerably in North Mayo. The population is very scattered. I would respectfully request the Minister to widen the regulations governing the transport of children to and from school. It is unfair that small children in cold, mountain districts should have to travel three miles and more in winter weather to and from school. They are bound to get wet and have to spend the whole day in their wet clothes in school and then tramp home again. It should be possible to provide transport for such children. That would prevent the possibility of their being patients in a sanatorium. I would suggest that the Minister should consider transporting children, where there would be at least six children, from any place that is over two miles from a school. The money would be well spent. I know of townlands in Mayo where children have to travel four miles to school. They are: Altnabrucky, Sheeaun-Burren, Glinsk-Glenamoy, Derryhillagh, Doonaroya. In these areas we cannot get the number of children required under the regulations. Therefore, I would respectfully request the Minister to broaden the school transport regulations so as to allow children from backward areas to be brought to school. The children in these areas are sufficiently handicapped already. It is unfair to ask them to travel three miles to and from school every day.

There is another question that is worrying me. In certain areas in Mayo it is not possible to get a qualified teacher. I do not know how the Minister will get over that difficulty. The children are already handicapped enough without having to depend on untrained or inefficient teachers.

These are matters that I hope the Minister will attend to. I know he is sympathetic towards the problems ofthe children in the country, especially those in backward, mountain areas. I trust he will do his best to remedy the matters that I have brought before him to-day.

Minister for Education (Mr. Moylan)

We have gone over such a wide range in regard to education that I find it difficult to know where to begin. It is, of course, the business of an Opposition to use all legitimate means to show the Government and the Department concerned in an unfavourable light. I have no great objection to that but it seems to be that much of the discussion has been an advocacy of perfectionism. If we are to tackle all the problems in the way that would be advocated here, I am afraid the Education Estimate would swamp the whole Budget.

First of all, about the school buildings. I have great sympathy with Deputy Calleary in regard to the building or the repair of schools in his district. That is not a problem that confines itself to County Mayo. It is a widespread problem and covers the whole Twenty-Six Counties. If we are to get any respect for education or any concern for education in the country, one of the first things we must do as a Government, as public representatives, is to provide schools which will show the respect we ourselves have for education.

I am not at all satisfied, of course, that the State is wholly blameworthy in regard to the present condition of the schools. We have made a good deal of progress in the provision of well-designed schools suitable for their purpose. I am not quite satisfied with the association there is between the Department of Education and the Board of Works. I am not satisfied that a survey of the condition of school buildings has been completed, that we know what the problem is, and I certainly find myself in the Department of Education without proper control of one aspect of it, that is, the building and the repair of schools. A change must be made in that association between the Department of Education and the Board of Works if we are to make the progress in the provisionof school buildings that we should make.

I am very grateful to Deputy Cogan and to Deputy Desmond for the attitude they have taken up in regard to the maintenance of schools and the local contribution. I am determined that, no matter what difficulties school managers may find themselves in, no school in future will be built in any area if there is not some attempt made to provide the local contribution. The good times are gone. The times when somebody could come into the Department of Education and get away with no contribution are finished. There will have to be a local contribution if we are to cultivate any sense of responsibility in the people, any personal concern among them for education.

I have heard this year and again last year something about the cleaning and heating of schools. Some of the Deputies here were horrified at the idea that a much greater expenditure could not be undertaken or would not be undertaken in regard to cleaning and heating, particularly cleaning. They were horrified at the idea. Deputy Alfred Byrne was one, some Deputy in the Labour Party was another of those who protested against the idea that children should be in any fashion asked to keep the school in the condition in which it should be kept. I have no desire to impose any undue efforts on teacher or child in relation to keeping the school in proper condition. I read a few days ago in the Irish School Weeklyan account of “A Country School of Long Ago”:—

"Two children arrived early to light the fire and dust the room; two remained late to sweep the room and leave things tidy."

Deputies are horrified that that should happen to-day—

"Our annual examination was held in April. School and grounds were thoroughly spring-cleaned for the great occasion. Parents spread fresh gravel on the playground, and the manager got the well cleaned out, the hedges clipped, and the schoolroom whitewashed. Then thepupils took over. We swept and dusted and polished with a will. The little ones gathered moss and primroses, for last thing on examination eve we filled the window-sills with damp moss dotted with bunches of primroses."

An Ceann Comhairle

Will the Minister give the date?

Mr. Moylan

The Irish School Weeklyfor June 6th, 1953. That is the story of a happy successful school where the teacher inspired many of the pupils to become the exemplary pupils which they became. I can see no reason in the world why that condition should not be continued in the school. I know that in the ordinary country school the charwoman will once a week give a thorough cleansing to the school. Surely the children could do a good deal towards keeping the school neat and tidy during the week. While I am being criticised very severely for making that statement, I still make it. I think it is true. The only alternative to it is probably to spend at least another £100,000 on an attribute of education which has very little to do with education.

As to the heating of schools, the whole trouble is the inadequate fireplaces. Many of the old fireplaces are merely swallowers of turf and coal and provide no heat throughout the schoolroom. We cannot very well remedy that in the older schools, those that have to be rebuilt. But in the newer schools it is quite possible to give an even heating temperature and that is being done.

When I came into the Department of Education, one of the ideas I had was that we would not be able to go full tilt ahead with the provision of the schools we need as our building trades operatives are absorbed in the housing drive. Knowing that that would ease up at some particular time, I had hoped that we would absorb the disemployed building workers in a drive to provide these schools. That can be done and it should be done. I am making every effort to ensure that it shall be done and I want the full support of every Party in the House in getting it done.

Deputy Palmer kicked off by telling us that the teachers were improperly trained, that they were too secluded from the general life of the country, and urged that we should provide university training for them. As I said in my opening statement, with very few exceptions, our teachers have proved to be good teachers, to have benefited as a result of the courses of training they got. I have stated already and I say again that I see no reason for changing the system of training or the conditions under which teachers are trained. If it is said that the students are too cut off from the general life of the country, the same may be said of every secondary school in the country. In our preparatory schools, the very same conditions obtain as obtain in the secondary schools throughout the country. I think Deputy Cunningham had something to say about that—that many of them become teachers by accident. I became Minister by a pure accident. Whatever we become, very few of us become what we are as a result of a definite plan from the day we came out of the cradle. Most world happenings are ruled by an outside power over which we have no control.

Deputy Ormonde spoke about the rather niggardly way in which the Government treated ex-teachers who retired at a particular date. Those teachers got everything that was due to them according to contract. They got something more; they got an ex-gratiagrant which my predecessor, taking the same view as I did, made every attempt to secure for them and was unable to secure for them. Owing to the more enlightened outlook of another Minister for Finance, I was able to secure a substantial benefit for them and there should be no particular grouse about that.

Deputy Palmer and Deputy Gallagher spoke of the extra-mural activities of teachers. I have seen many of them interest themselves with work outside the school with which the children were concerned. That attitude on the part of these teachers represents the difference between the professional man and, shall we say, the businessman. Oneis prepared to do something away and beyond what he is paid for and the other is not. If we are merely going to depend for education on the amount of work we can pay for, we will never have education. If men are not sufficiently interested in the work to do that little bit extra, without pay, then there is very little use talking about professionalism among teachers.

Deputy Palmer also misunderstood the idea of training for backward children. He said that putting children into a backward class gave them an inferiority complex. That is not true. We find that in organising a backward class and putting it into operation the child grew brighter and more effective. Some of them were able to go back again to the ordinary classes and do well in them. It is in the ordinary schools where those children are left that the damage is being done and not where we are doing it.

Deputy Palmer also said that a school inspector generally picks on the backward and dull child in the class and by questioning him makes him feel inferior and incompetent. We all have experience of that. Somebody comes along to examine and he puts his finger on the weak point. I am sure Deputy Palmer exaggerated much because no inspector, no decent man, will try to embarrass a child of that nature. I do not think there is any substance in Deputy Palmer's argument.

Deputy Rooney and Deputy Desmond spoke about school books. I cannot understand why the ordinary school book should pass to every member of a family. I do not understand how the ordinary cheap school book can be used for more than one year by one child and survive to be used by another the next time. There is a fairly reasonable amount provided for the purchase of school books by necessitous people. It may be necessary that that should be expanded, but I do not think the argument that a book should pass from generation to generation holds good. I have been trying to propagate the idea of the development everywhere of a school library. I feel that would save books a good deal. I think that the libraries would have atremendously educative effect upon the child if we organised them everywhere. I am hopeful of doing that.

Deputy Cunningham was rather doleful. As usual, he made the statement that the teachers were not paid as well as the members of other professions. Mind you, it would be very interesting to find out how a number of supposedly highly paid professional men are paid. I want to be quite clear on the question of my proposal of free time for teachers to do what they want in the schools. Deputy Cunningham disapproved completely of it. He did not see anything in the idea. He did not understand it. I did not mention a half hour a day. I mentioned a free half day every week in which the teacher might use his own initiative without inspection, examination or question. I hold the idea that each teacher has his own particular line of country, some ideas of his own and some capacity of his own in respect of which he is far beyond his fellow. If given an opportunity of using his particular gift on the child it would be valuable for the child. It would be the ideal thing in the school to let the teacher do what he likes all the time. That is my idea, but all teachers have not the capacity to handle a problem like a school completely without regulations. Some exceptional man might do it. If we gave half a day a week to the teacher to permit him to do a particular subject or any subject he wanted it would have the effect of broadening the child's mind and of giving the child a much greater interest in education.

I was surprised to hear Deputy Cunningham talk about the overloading of the programme. I have been hearing about the overloading of the programme for many years. I am not concerned with anything in the schools except the teaching of the three R's. All this talk about the grave problem of teaching two languages, as if it were a most unbearable burden, is something in which I do not believe. I do not believe it is an argument.

A number of Deputies spoke about Irish and the compulsory teaching of Irish. The compulsion that is spokenof does not exist in the schools, to my mind. It would be unwise, in my view, that we should try to educate any child in a language which he does not understand, and there is no attempt to do so. Children are taught through the medium of Irish when they understand Irish and when the teacher is thoroughly competent to teach through the medium of Irish. Otherwise, they are discouraged from the use of Irish in teaching the ordinary subjects. I think that is as it should be, but this story about compulsory Irish is more than exaggerated. It is untrue. I want to say again that I have no use for those people who blather about "bás don Bhéarla". I think it would be tragic for us if we were to lose the English language. I think the wise thing is to aim at bilingualism.

Mr. Dillon

Hear, hear!

Mr. Moylan

And I wish to protest against the idea that we are so benighted as to attempt to teach children and educate them through the medium of a language they do not know. We are entitled to teach them Irish and we shall do that to the very best of our ability.

Deputy Blowick spoke about the closing of schools in the Gaeltacht. I am most adverse to the closing of any school. It is only when I find it impossible to carry on in any reasonable fashion in such a school that I would consent to close it. As far as I can remember, the problem arose in Deputy Blowick's area in relation to the impossibility of getting a teacher. That is a problem which, I think, Deputy Calleary raised a while ago. I have no way of forcing teachers to go into backward schools and, unfortunately, a school has to be closed now and again. I think Deputy Blowick will admit that it is only under grave circumstances of difficulty that we close any school. I am completely against the idea of closing a school if we can keep it open.

Deputy Corish mentioned the question of trade apprentices not being accepted in vocational schools because the classes were already filled with amateurs—people who went there as a pastime. I think that is wrong. IfDeputy Corish is right in what he says, I think that in the vocational schools we must make provision at least first for trade apprentices. In the Sunday Independentof the 7th June last, we read the following paragraph in an article entitled: “Schools fit to learn in”:

"The educational authorities have too marked a tendency to boast of what they have done—a good deal, admittedly—and too little apparent anxiety to realise the vast amount that remains to be done. The children of Ireland must be given the schools they deserve."

That is not correct. We in the Department do not boast of what we have done. We realise the vast amount that has to be done. I think that we talk too little about ourselves and that we need to indulge in a little publicity. The annual report of all Departments arrives about three years late. While it may be a valuable document from a statistical point of view it is very little use from a publicity point of view. So little do we publicise ourselves that recently I read this extract in a Danish textbook used for the teaching of English:

"IRELAND—And now at last I shall tell you a little about Ireland. It is a farming country. The people live in little villages and work in the fields. Most of the Irish are poor. They grow potatoes, and keep cows, pigs and chickens. The ground is generally too wet for corn, so the Irish do not eat much bread. They use potatoes instead. They live in small cottages; most of them have only two rooms. The floor inside the cottage is only the hard ground, and the pigs and chickens go in and out as they like.

There is a big city called Belfast, which has many factories. They make Irish linen there, such as tablecloths and handkerchiefs.

Belfast is in Ulster, which still belongs to Great Britain, but the rest of Ireland is now called the Irish Republic or Eire and is now quite independent of the British Empire."

That was in a school book published in 1952 and used for the teaching of English. Instead of saying that we talk too much about our accomplishments we ought to do a little talking about them and let people in other countries know what we are doing.

Mr. Dillon

Was that book published in Ireland?

Mr. Moylan

Oh no. I gave my views in relation to education, and what we are trying to do in that regard, in my opening remarks and I am now replying to the few worth-while points that were made.

I agree very much with Deputy Calleary that there is a grave necessity for speeding-up the repair of school buildings and I am very much concerned with the reorganisation of the methods for tackling that problem.

I should like to tell Deputy Mulcahy that our relations with the teachers are good. I think that as we appreciate their worth so also do they understand our difficulties. We want to continue these harmonious relations and we hope that this conciliation scheme will be resumed immediately the legal proceedings are over. Meanwhile, we have made certain arrangements which tend to preserve what I call the harmonious relations and, therefore, we have very little difficulty on that head at the moment.

I want to impress on the Dáil that we will not get respect or concern for education if we do not concern ourselves deeply with the provision of new schools and the putting of the structurally sound schools into good condition. We will not get respect or concern for education unless we insist on a local contribution for the erection of the schools and we must try to insist on the proper maintenance of the schools. I was in one school which was 120 years old. It is a bright school and in perfect condition—as good as if it were built only ten years ago. There must have been a succession of good teachers and managers there. On the other hand, I have seen other schools built as recently as 30 years ago and they are complete wrecks. If we are going to permit anybody to allowschools to deteriorate to that extent in 30 years, we shall never overcome the difficulty of building all the schools we need. Therefore, we must have not merely a strong effort by the Department of Education but also the co-operation of the people generally in maintaining and keeping the schools.

Mr. Dillon

I was trying to get Baldwin's Rural Readerbrought up to date for use in the national schools. Perhaps, at the Minister's convenience, he would make inquiries with the Department of Agriculture as to whether that book is ready for publication? If he approves of it, the Minister might consider expediting its publication, thus restoring some slant to agriculture in our national schools.

Mr. Moylan

I do not know if the Department of Agriculture are engaged on it. I did not hear that they were. I have a copy of Baldwin's from my old days. I never liked the damn thing.

Mr. Dillon

I did.

Mr. Moylan

I am concerned for this. You must give the children the fundamentals. They must be taught to read, write and cipher. If you cannot give them that, they cannot do anything else.

I said in my opening remarks that I read all the textbooks for the teaching of the English language. I found them good, interesting and educative. I condemn the Baldwin Reader because, while it was written by a really good writer and was intended very much to be a rural reader, it was not something that would grip the minds of the children. It was away and beyond them. It was for a city man with a sort of a yearning for the country but who did not understand what the country was. I hated the Baldwin Reader long ago. The only people I heard speak in praise of it were very old parish priests—and none of them became a farmer as a result of reading Baldwin. It might be possible—and I should like to do it —to give some rural bias in our training in the schools. I think it can be done, but not by way of Baldwin. I have seen a number of charts and some exhibits in vocational schools which wereof tremendous interest to me and which would, I think, grip the minds of children. By way of such charts and certain exhibits, we would probably get an interest in local matters. It all boils down, however, to the fact that it all depends on the teacher. If we had the teacher we could do anything. Where you have a teacher with that particular type of mind, you can do anything with children.

Mr. Dillon

The Minister will, perhaps, look at the revised edition of Baldwin?

Mr. Moylan

I will do that.

Mr. Blowick

Has the Minister any comment to make on the suggestion I put forward with regard to mentally retarded children?

Mr. Moylan

The problem is not great in the country. In the rural schools, it is a very small problem and is of significant proportions only in a city like Dublin. I am speaking not of what might be called mental deficients but of rather backward children. Mental deficients have to be dealt with in another fashion, but there are children who are retarded from one cause or another and who have to be given specialised treatment to bring them forward.

It is our experience—we have the good luck to have one good man handling that particular problem at the moment—that, with the exception of those who are abnormal, most of the backward children respond to sympathetic treatment, which they cannot get in the ordinary classes. I do not know how we could handle the very few there are in the country, but here in Dublin the only way in which it can be done is by having special classes for backward children with a special type of sympathetic teacher. We have been very successful in one school and we propose now to extend the idea.

Motion—"That the Estimate be referred back for reconsideration"—by leave, withdrawn.

Vote put and agreed to.