I should like to ask the Minister if the operations of this Bill extend to the North, or if they are limited to the Free State. I hope the Minister will see the Bill extended to the North because people in the North have suffered terribly and I would like that they should get some sort of chance of reparation after all they have done and the great suffering they have gone through.
Damage to Property (Compensation) (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill, 1933—Final Stages.
Question proposed: "That the Bill be received for final consideration."
The position, of course, is that this Bill makes no provision to compensate any person for damage done to his property who is not a citizen of Saorstát Eireann. The position of the Nationalists in Northern Ireland has been brought before the notice of the Government, and it has been represented to them that very serious losses indeed were suffered by the Nationalists in the Six County area during the period prior to and subsequent to the truce. If it were possible the Government would wish to recoup these losses but the resources at its disposal would not permit this to be done. For the same reasons and because of the difficulty attending on the investigation and verification of the claims, the Government has been compelled to exclude from the scope of the present measure certain categories of losses sustained in Saorstát Eireann— billeting, cash taken or lent and consequential losses.
I think that even Senator Colonel Moore will admit that the investigation of applications in respect of property losses in Northern Ireland would be much more difficult that the investigation of claims in the Saorstát. Moreover the Bill contemplates that losses sustained within the territory under the jurisdiction of the Government will be disposed of through the medium of the Circuit Courts and procedure of this kind, of course, would not be possible in the case of Northern Ireland claims. Bearing in mind all these disabilities to which I have referred, the Government has been considering whether a limited class of Northern Ireland claims, where peculiar features exist, would be admitted with a view to the paying of compensation. It may be within the knowledge of the Seanad that persons whose property was maliciously injured in the Six Counties could have obtained compensation from the Northern Ireland Courts under the Criminal Injuries Act but, as against this, compensation was invariably denied by these courts where the damage was inflicted by official force on the plea of military necessity.
It will be remembered that in Dáil Eireann in 1929, the previous Administration decided to admit claims for damage to property in the Six Counties in the pre-truce period where applications for compensation were made to and refused by the Northern Courts on the plea of military necessity. The Government has now decided that compensation should be paid in cases of a like nature where the damage was sustained between the date of the truce and the commencement of the attack on the Four Courts, that is, between 12th July, 1921, and 28th June, 1922. It is proposed, as was done in the instance of the pre-truce cases which I have mentioned, that claims within the category which I have outlined will be investigated and dealt with by the Department of Finance. It has also been decided that the latest date for the receipt of applications in the Department will be 1st January, 1934. This will give ample time to intending applicants to forward their claims.
As to the reason which has moved the Government to take action in this matter, it has been represented to them that during the period between the truce and the attack on the Four Courts, the date which I have referred to in June, 1922, operations were carried out by Republican forces in the Six Counties and that these operations had, if not the actual consent, at any rate the connivance of the authorities which were then in control of the Twenty-Six Counties. The principle having been admitted where these acts were carried out under official auspices prior to the truce and in consequence of them property was destroyed by the Crown forces as of military necessity, the logical thing to do is to apply it during the whole period, when the control of the Republican forces in the Six Counties was uncertain and where in the great majority of cases those who were responsible for acts of warfare there felt that they were acting under the legitimate authority here.
I am thankful to the Minister for the statement he has made and I am glad that he is attending to the claims of people who suffered in the northern area.
Question put and agreed to.
Question—"That the Bill do now pass"—put and agreed to.