asked the Minister for Finance if he will state with reference to that portion of the Rotunda Gardens which was acquired in 1939 by the Government of the day as a site for a garden of remembrance to commemorate the officers and men of the Dublin Brigade of the Irish Republican Army who died in the struggle to establish and maintain the Irish Republic (i) the date on which the present Government decided to hand the site over to the committee of the Rotunda Hospital; (ii) the terms and conditions on which the committee in question have been given the use of the site, and (iii) whether it is proposed to execute a legal agreement or conveyance, embodying such terms and conditions or whether such an agreement has in fact been executed.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Rotunda Gardens Site.
At a meeting of the Government held on the 29th July, 1949, it was decided to accede to the request of the Governors of the Rotunda Hospital to have the site made available to them as a temporary measure in connection with an infant welfare scheme. In pursuance of this decision the Commissioners of Public Works, in whom the site is vested, granted a letting of the site to the governors as from 1st November, 1949, at a rent of 1d. per annum by way of acknowledgment that the governors' occupation is only by the permission of, and during the will and pleasure of, the commissioners. The governors are required to pay any rates that may be assessable and to maintain the site, and they are debarred from parting with possession of it or using it otherwise than for the erection of temporary buildings for an infant welfare unit. The letting is terminable forthwith if the site is required at any time for the public service or in connection with any scheme of development, and on determination the governors may be required to restore it to its former condition. These terms and conditions have been embodied in a formal agreement between the commissioners and the governors.