I beg to move the motion standing in my name:—
"That the Seanad wishes to impress on the Executive Council the necessity of introducing at an early date legislation on the general lines of the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission."
This Commission was appointed in 1925, with General Mulcahy as Chairman, and I think if I read for you the letter written by President Cosgrave to General Mulcahy it will be putting to you the case more concisely than I would be able to put it before the House, and I think my reading of it will save the time of the Honse considerably. Here is the letter:—
"The Commission of which you are Chairman has been formed, and its terms of reference drawn up, in the hope that proper inquiry will lead to a clear and definite national policy in respect of those districts and local populations which have preserved the Irish language as the language of their homes.
By the Constitution of Saorstát Eireann, Irish is expressly recognised as the national language. Its maintenance and cultivation has always been an important element of the national policy which has led up to the establishment of a Sovereign State in Ireland. Of this policy the Oireachtas and the Government of Saorstát Eireann are the appointed trustees. We believe that the Irish people, as a body, recognise it to be a national duty, incumbent on their representatives and their Government as on themselves, to uphold and foster the Irish language, the central and most distinct factor of the tradition which is Irish nationality, and that everything that can be rightly and effectively done to that end will be in accordance with the will of the Irish people. We recognise the facts and the factors that have militated in the past, and by force of continuity still militate in large part against the very existence of the Irish language; its exclusion from most of the activities of public life, from "Court and Bar and business;" its exclusion for generations from nearly all our schools; how it fell under a kind of social ban and became in the minds of many a badge of poverty and backwardness. The neglect and contempt, the ignominy and the abuse to which it has been subjected, are a part of our tragic history. These very things, and their unfortunate effects, instead of infecting us with their spirit and making us also contemptuous and apathetic, ought rightly to enliven our purpose to undo the damage of the past—the more so, because the possession of a cultivated national language is known by every people who have it to be a secure guarantee of the national future. Our language has been waylaid, beaten and robbed, and left for dead by the wayside, and we have to ask ourselves if it is to be allowed to lie there, or if we are to heal its wounds, place it in safety and under proper care, and have it restored to health and vigour.
We recognise also that the future of the Irish language and its part in the future of the Irish nation depend, more than on anything else, on its continuing in an unbroken tradition as the language of Irish homes. This tradition is the living root from which alone organic growth is possible. For this reason, the Irish people rightly value as a national asset their "Gaeltacht," the scattered range of districts in which Irish is the home language.
These districts are known to coincide more or less with areas of rural Ireland which present an economic problem of the greatest difficulty and complexity. The language problem and the economic problem are in close relation to each other, and your Commission is asked to consider both together.
The public will look with eager interest to the course and outcome of your inquiries, and public opinion may be expected to support any practical measures that can be instituted to safeguard the future of Irish as the home language and the economic future of the people who use Irish as their ordinary and principal language of intercourse with each other."
That letter, of course, makes it perfectly clear that we are dealing with the Irish as a language that is the home language of the people. This Commission having heard many witnesses, visited many districts, and consulted everybody who could speak with any degree of authority, has issued a very valuable report and a number of recommendations, and it is to get these recommendations carried into effect as soon as possible that I am moving this motion.
I may say at once, that I believe that the Executive Council in appointing this Commission, and in its actions since, is actuated by the sentiments expressed in the preceding letter. I have some reason to know that through administrative channels they are making such administrative arrangements as will enable them to do what I am asking them to do here in this motion.
I tabled this motion because I attended a meeting at which the view was expressed that the Government did not intend to carry out the recommendations of the Gaeltacht Commission. I expressed dissent from that statement. I went beyond that, and I said that I would be very much surprised to find that such could be possible, because every action of the Government led me to believe that it was serious in its intention in dealing with the Irish language and carrying out the Report of the Commission.
It is a matter of extreme urgency, for appended to the Report are some schedules as to the number of Irish speakers in those districts. I give one as an example. It is from the County Cork. Perhaps it is an extreme case, but though an extreme case it is only typical of a great number of cases. I take Schull in the County Cork. In 1901 there were 2,211 Irish speakers in that district; in 1911 that 2,211 had shrunk to 1,487, and in 1925 it had shrunk to 184. So that if any good is to be done, in accordance with the sentiments expressed in the President's letter, we will have to act quickly. The districts set aside are in rural areas where the present problem presents great economic difficulties and in addition to that there are the points set forth in an addendum by one of the Commissioners, Mr. L. C. Moriarty, who in his addendum says:—"The economic development of the Gaeltacht is, to my mind, a national duty. The establishment of the Congested Districts Board in 1891 was virtually an act of reparation by the British Government of the day. The process of improving the standard of living in the Irish-speaking districts which was being carried on, if somewhat slowly, at all events, surely by that Board, has, in my opinion, been slowed down since that Board was abolished."
That is only one paragraph of his addendum, but that in itself is so suggestive in fact, apart altogether from the preservation of the language, as to show that those districts present problems of economic difficulties which should be immediately tackled because no other problem is greater or more pressing. If the problem was not so great, still the problem of immediate urgency would exist which any Government entrusted with the well-being of the country should immediately attend to. There is the ordinary teaching of Irish in the schools and the universities, and in that respect the Government is doing and has done a good deal.
In the schools and universities those who study it and like to study some little branch of other things find it useful for examinations, but after the examination is over they proceed to forget it. I am afraid that as far as large numbers of them are concerned they only use the language to get into the Government service, and after that they pay no further attention to it.
But if the recommendations of this Commission are carried out, that will not be any longer so. Unless the recommendations are carried out, no good can be expected from the President's letter. Perhaps I might be permitted to refer to this matter now, for I anticipate some opposition to this motion. One of the recommendations of the Commission is that certain grass lands in the Gaeltacht should be broken up, not the grass lands in the County Meath or Westmeath, but the grass lands in the Gaeltacht. One of the recommendations of the Commission is that the grass lands in the western counties be broken up, and that they be distributed amongst Irish-speaking families, and that the claims, if there are claims, of English-speaking families be satisfied outside the Gaeltacht. A week or so ago, to be exact, on 24th February, the Senator who has tabled an amendment to this motion, having regard particularly to the last recommendation which I read out, proceeded at a meeting of the Irish Cattle Traders' and Stock-owners' Association to refer to this matter. I believe that that Association deals with the trade in live stock. In his address as chairman, dealing with that particular phase and with the decline of that branch of the trade, he said:—
"The question naturally arose, to what was the falling off in the exports of live stock attributable? Was it lack of supply or lack of demand? He thought that the answer inclined more to the view that the falling off was due to the lack of supply."
He then went on to refer to the prices and to trade fights between foreign meat trusts and to the coal strike, and continued thus:
"Those causes would to some extent lessen the demand for Irish produce; be that as it might, he was still of opinion that the cause was lack of supply."
The "Irish Times," commenting on this speech, went on to say:—
"These causes, however, are far from explaining the whole of the year's adverse trade. They represent faults in the demand; but as Senator Counihan said yesterday, the chief fault lies in the supply. There were not sufficient Irish beasts of good quality and at economic prices on offer. The reason is sadly obvious to all who have gone about the countryside looking at depleted meadows and talking with our troubled farmers. In the best grazing districts many farms are but half stocked, and in some areas they are virtually denuded of their animal population. The re-stocking of the farms of half the country is an immense task."
The putting of these recommendations of the Gaeltacht Commission into effect would not inflict any injustice on those who now have grazing lands which they are not able to stock.
Even if that were not so I decline to have our people warned off the grass at the behest of bullockdom. It is well that those engaged in that trade should realise that. This question of the preservation of the Gaeltacht is one question in which every section of national thought, idea and aspiration can bring men of different views, different and diverse views, on to one platform. No other question in this country to-day can do that. Any material interest that stands in its way should be done away with or inconvenicnced if necessary. There is another amendment to my resolution which really makes me think that the Senator who tabled it cannot have looked at the Report at all. He refers to the desirability of ascertaining the wishes of the parents of the children. I will give you some of the recommendations on which the parents of the children will be consulted. We have to look in the graves for some of the parents. There are comprehensive schemes of general reclamation and arterial drainage, afforestation, the establishment of schools for the instruction of fishermen in Connemara, Donegal and Dingle. The Commission further recommends that in addition to the motor vessels assigned to the technical schools, the remaining vessels to the number of about 22, which the State now has on hands, should be kept in commission. Each vessel should be placed under a competent captain-instructor and a motor driver and be manned by a fishing crew selected from the most promising young men in the Gaeltacht, who should receive systematic instruction in modern fishing methods and a small number of experts to be employed for the purpose of organising industry. Are these the things on which the parents would be consulted? I really think that before anyone tables an amendment on such an important thing as this he should give it some more consideration than he has given. Now I will abstain further from detaining the House and will formally move the motion standing in my name. I have no doubt whatever that the Executive Council will carry out the recommendations as far as they possibly can be carried out and as they are embodied in this Report.