asked the Minister for Lands why a young farmer (name supplied) with three children and only a two-cow farm was not given portion of the Dwyer estate which was recently divided by the Land Commission at Liggan, Cloughboley, County Sligo.
71.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Division of sligo Estates.
70.
asked the Minister for Lands why a small farmer (name supplied) with a young family was not given portion of the Dwyer estate or the Clancy estate at Cloughboley, County Sligo, when they were divided.
With your permission, a Cheann Comhairle, I propose to take Questions Nos. 70 and 71 together.
The selection of allottees is a matter that is exclusively reserved to the Land Commissioners. I have ascertained from the Land Commission that applications from the persons referred to in the questions were fully considered in competition with other applications received but that, having regard to the limited acreage available for disposal —49 acres—on the Dwyer and Clancy estates, it was not found possible to provide them with allotments. The lands were divided on 5th of this month amongst five local smallholders who were adjudged the most worthy and suitable. Due to the small amount of land available none of the allottees could be brought up to the current family farm standard and 12 other smallholder-applicants could not be provided with any allotments.
Is the Minister aware that those people have been waiting for six or seven years for the division of this land? Is he aware also that there are, in the immediate vicinity, three farmers, married, with three in family in two cases and eight in family in another case, who have been refused any portion of this land? Is he further aware that it has been given to two farmers one of whom has no family and who is in very comfortable circumstances? The inspectors made seven visits to a man with five acres and assured him he had nothing to worry about, and when the land was being divided his two cows that were grazing on this land were turned out on the road.
As I have already mentioned, the selection of allottees is a matter which is exclusively for the Land Commissioners. I am sure the Deputy is aware that the amount of land available in this case was very small, only 49 acres, that there were a very large number of applicants, and that 12 of these applicants, smallholders, did not receive any allotment. In a case such as that, no matter how the land is divided, there will always be a considerable number of people who are dissatisfied.
I certainly agree that the amount of land available was small, but will the Minister not admit that one farmer in quite comfortable circumstances was given an allocation of land as against the married man with three children having 11 statute acres only 200 yards away from this land? Would the Minister also agree that a farmer with three children, having 13 acres and only two cows, with only a fence between him and this land, was denied portion of the land, after seven visits from an inspector? Again another local farmer with five in family, having five acres of land and paying £60 per year for grazing, and living only a quarter of a mile from each of these two farms that were divided, got none of this land, while portion of it was given to a married farmer with no children and in comfortable circumstances. It is very hard to explain that.
I am sure that if the inspector visited this man so often he was giving very fair consideration to his case. As I explained to the Deputy, these five applicants who got land were not brought up to anything like the standard of an economic holding. The Commissioners are in a rather difficult position in relation to cases such as this. Where there is so little land available and so many applicants, they have to decide on the people they think are for various reasons most deserving. In this instance they have decided on five people as being the most suitable and most deserving applicants.