This Vote gives an opportunity of which I would crave the kindness of the House to allow me to avail in order to call attention to the general position in regard to industrial schools. Last autumn I called attention to the necessity for reform in connection with the Borstal Institution for which the Minister is responsible. I got no reply on that occasion. This, however, is a much greater problem because, as the House will observe, according to the Estimate, there are in industrial schools 5,883 children as well as 112 in the reformatories, and to all intents and purposes the Dáil is the guardian of these children. We are responsible for them. We have taken them over in the name of the State, and periodically we ought to revise the position in regard to them in order to see how they are being treated and whether proper facilities are given to them to enable them to take their place in the world. We ought also find out whether improved conditions can be made for them. If that is so, as I believe it is, we ought to impress on the Minister for Education, who is responsible, the necessity for taking up this problem and dealing with it. It is true, as has been stated, in connection with the Children's Bill which is at present before the House, that the matter has, to some extent, been dealt with in the report of the Poor Law Commission. I do not, however, think that that is quite sufficient. The report simply deals with the matter from the point of view of taking these children who are, to some extent, destitute, and providing them with some amenities to fit them for life. The report of the Poor Law Commission looks at it from somewhat the same angle as did the original founders of the industrial school system.
Since the industrial schools were founded in 1868—that is a long time ago—there has been no improvement in the conditions or regulations governing these establishments. At that time the idea was to take homeless waifs and strays and provide for them some place, not exactly a workhouse, but like a workhouse, which even still, despite our boasted civilisation and desire to help those who cannot help themselves, bears the stigma of the workhouse. Unfortunately these children, through no fault of their own, have to carry that stigma with them, and it is a serious handicap in getting a place in life. I am told that under the regulations made in 1868, which are laid down in various British Blue Books, the desire and intention in setting up industrial schools was to give a home to these waifs and strays, and give them sufficient education to bring them up to, but not above, the fourth standard. That is the way the position remains to-day.
In addition to that, the intention was to give them a certain amount of manual work or manual training. There is much talk about a technical education scheme and about the whole basis of technical education being revised. I think that it is up to the Minister to see whether the industrial school system cannot be brought into line with improvements that are being projected in the case of technical education. These boys—I am not familiar with the case in regard to girls and can only speak about boys—get themselves trained in certain trades for two and a half years and are brought up to this standard of a rather unsubstantial elementary education. At the age of sixteen they are let loose on the world and if the directors of industrial schools are not able to find positions for them nobody is able to do so. Obviously, the managers of the labour exchanges who are the only other officials responsible will not be able to do it. I believe that the managers of industrial schools have had the greatest difficulty in placing these boys. About 800 vacancies are made every year so that we can take it that 700 or 800 boys leave industrial schools every year, but what are their chances of getting employment? They have been trained to certain trades which are either dead or dying. Some of the boys have been trained to harness making, a trade which is on the decline, some to milling and weaving, trades which are practically dead, and even in the case of tailors and blacksmiths, and other trades like those which flourished twenty or thirty years ago, there is very little possibility for boys. They must try and find employment as improvers in certain organised trades in towns.
They have little chance of doing so. These trades are dying out and the industries with which they are connected are dying also. There are very few vacancies left in the organised trades and where there are vacancies the trades unions have their own regulations. A boy not alone is unable to find employment, after leaving an industrial school, but he is not even able to be accepted as an apprentice as there is no financial support behind him. Even if by his skill, ability, and intelligence he proves himself capable as an apprentice it is impossible to have him taken in under the trades union regulations. That is the basis upon which we expect boys to be able to support themselves when leaving industrial schools. That system is quite archaic, quite antediluvian, quite out of line with modern conditions and it is impossible to expect boys with that training to find employment. I want to impress on the Minister the necessity for making room for such boys in his new technical education scheme, and to give 6,000 young citizens of An Saorstát exactly the same chance as every other boy and girl whose parents are able to look after them. We ask for nothing less and nothing more.
There are other matters which require consideration, apart from the improvement in technical training. There is, for instance, the question of improving the whole spirit and character of boys and girls in industrial schools. Whether it is the fault of the system, of the regulations, or of the unfortunate circumstances in which children are placed, I do not know, but I believe that they often leave industrial schools with very little initiative, with no sense of independence, but with a desire simply to lie there, as it were, until somebody drives them. That is a spirit that ought to be eradicated. Even if children have to be brought up in industrial schools, realising that they come from an inferior class and that their circumstances are not fortunate, we should endeavour to remove that stigma and put industrial schools, as far as possible, on the same basis as other schools, and give these children the idea that they are citizens of the State and not paupers. After all, most of the children in industrial schools are quite respectable. Their parents were respectable, but through certain circumstances, such as the death of the bread-winner of the family, they had to go to industrial schools.
In connection with agriculture, owing to the difficulties of the system, the directors and managers of industrial schools turn a large number of the boys to agricultural pursuits. They get a certain training on the farm and are then sent out, because, as I have said, there is a great difficulty in placing them in trades. There is some chance of placing them on a farm, because there is a desire on the part of the farmers to get labour, we will say, as easily as possible. A large number of the children are placed out with farmers. I believe the conditions, however, are very bad. I know cases myself where boys who were brought up in a truly religious atmosphere in some of the industrial schools, where they attended to their religion better than most of us, were afterwards allowed to drift, were not allowed to attend church or chapel for years, perhaps for three or four years, never got a suit of clothes, never were allowed to sleep in a proper bed, and never saw a penny until they ran away from the place and were fortunate enough to meet with sympathetic Civic Guards who gave them a few shillings to bring them home. That is the position in cases that I know of myself. The majority of cases may not be so bad, but the fact is that there is no proper supervision over children when they leave industrial schools, nor is there a proper effort made by the State to give them the advantage they should get out of this expenditure of £114,000 by getting them suitable employment. If it is impossible to get them employment, or if they are so backward in intelligence that they can be of no use, I submit that we ought to follow the lines of recent reforms in England and provide money to enable them to enter as apprentices whatever occupations or trades they wish.
Another disadvantage of the system is that the child is not in a position to take up a trade he fancies. These children are very often put into trades which they wholly dislike. They will not try to learn them. They want to be as modern as possible, and possibly most of these trades are dying out. We should either provide money to pay the apprenticeship fees of these boys or provide some kind of subsidy such as was suggested by an English Departmental Committee in 1927. We ought to provide money to pay some kind of subsidy or grant to persons who would take them in employment. I wish to call attention to one other matter in connection with the present administration of the system. The amount granted is 12s. per week per boy or girl. I think that is quite insufficient. Furthermore, that 12s. per week is not being paid as regularly as it should. In England, I understand, the amount is paid regularly in quarterly instalments. In this country it appears that the school has to work for the first four or five months of the year without any financial assistance. That is to say, the money is not forthcoming until the end of the year. It would be much better for those schools which have not any great resources or any endowments, and I think it would be purely a matter of book-keeping, to give them regular instalments at the end of each quarter. At any rate they ought not to be placed in the position of having no resources at their disposal in the early part of the year.
