GAELTACHT COMMISSION REPORT.

Mr. DOWDALL

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.

Mr. BENNETT

I have great pleasure in seconding the recommendation so ably put forward by Senator Dowdall. Before giving some reasons why I think this recommendation should be adopted, I would like to give my meed of praise to the members of the Commission who formulated this Report. One has read many reports of Commissions here and in other countries, and a Report showing greater thought, care and insight than this. I think, one never read or met with hitherto. They have proved themselves a body actively inspired with the genius of unity and national purposes, a body containing within itself the fruitful arguments that constrain the will of a nation towards the highest pitch. Forsooth this is a question not of the language in Ireland, but of the resuscitation of people who through an economic stress have been kept in the background. What do they desire to see? A contented people placed beyond the stage of barbarism. The position as adumbrated in the Commission's Report is an appalling one. People have not been given an opportunity to read the papers because, forsooth, they do not understand them. They make an existence by fishing and engaging in small trades. Here they are found by this Commission which goes amongst them, investigates their conditions and makes recommendations. I have not the least doubt but that the Executive Government will, as far as economically possible, put the recommendations of this Commission into full force and effect. If we consider the genesis of the Commission and the means by which it arrived at its conclusions we will be forced to the conclusion that they are just ones, and the only ones which, in the prevailing conditions, could possibly have been arrived at.

How did they proceed? They first and foremost took a census of the various localities in Ireland known to be Irish-speaking districts, and having scheduled these and the portions of Ireland purely Irish-speaking, they proceeded to investigate in detail what, economically, would give those people the opportunity of living in their own country. What recommendations do they make? I would ask you to throw your eye over the Report, and consider some of their recommendations and the reasons they give for showing that the recommendations were necessary. They say on page 30 of the Report that to an extent that must alarm those concerned for the preservation of the Irish language the Irish-speaking parent makes use of whatever English he has for speaking to his children, and over very large areas of the Gaeltacht the national language is thus failing to be traditionally transmitted in the homes. It is necessary to show these children who still speak Irish traditionally that not only does the State recognise the Irish language as the national language, but that they are determined to redress the disabilities from which that language has suffered and to restore its position and prestige.

Looking further afield we see the economic conditions in the Gaeltacht. It is there shown that in the year 1891 a Board which came to be called the Congested Districts Board was set up by the British Government with power to investigate local conditions. In 1909 on the recommendation of the Royal Commission on Congestion in Ireland the area of the congested districts was extended. It was pointed out in the Report that so bad were the conditions imposed on the Gaeltacht that it was impossible for the fruits of that Report to reach the most necessitous cases. Such was the condition of the inhabitants of many of those districts that the Royal Commission, in its Report, described them as "to a large extent the wrecks of past racial, religious, agrarian and social storms in Ireland and of famine catastrophes" adding "in a bad year they are saved from extreme privation only by relief measures and so constitute a serious financial danger to the nation; yet if men be the real test of the wealth of a nation they are a most valuable potential asset." There you have it pointed out that these men and women of the Gaeltacht and their families are essential to the good of the nation. They go on to say "In respect however of those areas which are now indicated as the Irish-speaking and partly Irish-speaking districts, in Donegal, West Mayo and West Galway, the conditions that the Congested Districts Board was set up to improve still exist almost untouched in some districts and very little improved in others."

They make recommendations for afforestation and fishing. Anyone, as I am sure the Seanad all have done, who takes the trouble to investigate methodically and with care these fishing recommendations must come to the conclusion that they are beneficial and will be advantageous. Towards the end what do they do? They invite the co-operation of the various classes of the community. All through the Report you find the co-operation of the clergy, professional men, legal, medical men, members and directors of industrial and commercial establishments.

This is putting as concisely as I can some of the recommendations of the Committee. They, being so complex in their nature, one can scarcely hope that they can all be given effect to in a short time. But there are recommendations which can be given effect to at once, and which would completely change the spirit in the administration of the Gaeltacht. The training is in the English language. Can you, therefore, expect people knowing no English, trained traditionally in Irish and Irish thought, to enter into the spirit of government? Can you expect them not to feel that they were an inferior race and that the blemish was put upon them owing to the English language being used in Government circles, that this inferior complex was urged upon them by the treatment of the Irish language in the past. What opportunities exist at present for instruction in agricultural subjects? It is only through itinerant instructors and assistant agricultural overseers. The work of the latter is very important, but is effected entirely through the medium of English. You will see what instruction people who do not understand English receive in a language they do not understand. As I said in the beginning, it is like forcing an open door to remind the Government to put this Report into force as quickly as possible. I will read one very pregnant paragraph in this Report:—

The Commission realises that in the memories, stories, folklore, songs and traditions of the Gaeltacht there is preserved an uninterrupted Gaelic culture which constitutes the very soul of the Irish language. The native Irish speaker has a command of the beauties of language which is inculcated amongst English speakers only by the laboured teaching of the classics. There is no parallel in English for this refined, popular culture, which is the highly-wrought product of generations of Gaelic civilisation. This popular culture is in grave danger of being lost, and the Commission feels that the revival of the language, without the preservation of this culture, would rob Ireland of one of its richest and most dignified inheritances. A proper utilisation of this material, especially in connection with vocational training, would, the Commission believes, serve to raise the whole mental and economic standard of the Gaeltacht to a level that would not otherwise be attained.

I do not desire our race to be absorbed undigested by an Anglo-Saxon civilisation. Are we to compel those people to leave the land they love because we do not give them economic opportunities of existing here? I would like to draw your attention to the fact that £3,500,000 is spent in education in this country and these very people for whom this Commission has succeeded in making a case are practically prevented from taking the least advantage of the money spent by us. Instruction is given in a language they do not understand. There is waste of manhood, waste of money, and of national thought in not securing that our fellow-countrymen should be given an opportunity of availing of the advantages that this State provides. I am quite certain that that opportunity will be given, as a result of the recommendation of this Commission, and for that reason I urge, and I feel, that the Executive Government will realise the necessity of putting into force with all speed, steps dealing with the problem. If I might I would refer to one part of the amendment that is tabled to this motion.

"To delete all after the word ‘council' and to substitute therefor the words ‘the desirability of taking steps to ascertain the wishes of the parents of the children concerned before introducing legislation on the lines of the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission.'"

An opportunity is imminent. A General Election will take place in two or three months. Will the Senator who tabled the amendment go to the electors with his argument and say: "I stand for this"? Let another man who stands for the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission say: "I stand for the Report." See which will be returned. That will cost the Senator nothing. He will have an ample opportunity then of ascertaining the wishes of parents and of the young men and women of the country. If the Senator succeeds I should never again speak for the Gael.

Mr. COUNIHAN

I move:

To add at the end of the motion the words "so far as may be practicable, and in particular the recommendations for the improvement of economic conditions; but believes that it would be most unjust and disastrous, and against the best interests of the Gaeltacht generally, to evict the large farmers from their homes."

Senator Dowdall paid me the compliment of referring to the speech I made at a meeting of the Irish Cattle Traders' Association, when I referred to the falling off in the exports of live stock. Senator Dowdall attributes the falling off to the land not being split up. He said my attitude was not consistent. The only remedy of people with grievances in this country is to split up the land, and that then you will remove all the grievances. Senator Dowdall forgets that the big falling-off in the cattle trade and live stock exports has taken place since 1923. In the ten years previous to that date there was not such a number of grass farms split as there was since 1923. Last year the climax in depreciated exports was reached. Unfortunately, anyone who wants to treat this language question in a common-sense way is put down as an enemy of Irish. Consequently the only people who discuss the matter now are the extremists on both sides. I am not against the Irish language. I will support any recommendation to foster and encourage the teaching of Irish, but I am absolutely opposed to compulsory Irish, and the teaching of other subjects in the schools through the medium of Irish. I cannot agree with all the findings of the Gaeltacht Commission, as I believe they are far too drastic and impracticable. Senator Dowdall has referred to one of the recommendations in the Report dealing with grass lands in the western counties.

Mr. DOWDALL

Especially in the Gaeltacht.

Mr. COUNIHAN

I am reading from the Report, which states that all the grass lands in the western counties should be broken up, and, in the resettlement, especially in the Gaeltacht, none but Irish-speaking families should be re-settled; that English-speaking families who claim land should have their claims satisfied outside the Gaeltacht. I am led to believe that the Land Commission intends to put that report into effect. I have had communications from several farmers in Connemara district who were notified by the Land Commission that it was their intention to do so.

I will give some particulars that I received from these people and the House can judge for itself the wisdom or justice of putting that recommendation into effect. The total valuation of T.W. Joyce is £63 5s. 0d. The Land Commission has notified him that they will take over £33 5s., leaving him with a valuation of £30. T. F. Joyce has a total valuation of £68 6s. The Land Commission propose to take £33 10s., leaving him with a valuation of £34 16s. J. M. Joyce has a total valuation of £59 15s. The Land Commission propose to take £33, leaving him with a valuation of £26 15s. Peter Joyce has a valuation of £28. The Land Commission propose to take the whole of it. T. Paul Joyce has a valuation of £54 10s. The Land Commission propose to take £24 15s., leaving him with a valuation of £29 15s. Peter King has a valuation of £108. The Land Commission propose to take over £96, leaving him with a valuation of £12. A representative of the O Maillies has a total valuation of £42. The Land Commission propose to take over £35, leaving only a valuation of £7. All these farmers live in the Maam Valley and the Leenane district. They are all relations and the direct descendants of the heads of the Joyce clan. They have occupied the land for centuries, and have given their name to the country. At best the farms are only mountain farms, and are most unsuitable for breaking up. Even if they were suitable for breaking up it would be most unjust to evict these people from homes on which they have such sentimental claims. I want to say to the Government and the Land Commission that if they do so they will create a lot of trouble in the country. These people will not leave their homes in a very peaceful manner.

I know the Irish-speaking districts well. It is by the votes of these people that I have the honour of sitting in this House, and consequently I consider I am entitled to put forward their views here. What the people in the Irish-speaking districts want is employment, by the provision of industries that will give them bread and butter for their children. It is not compulsory Irish they want. The Government should start some industries there, encourage fishing and build better houses for the people. If they do that they will be doing what the country will approve of and what it expects them to do. I did not move this amendment as a vote of censure on the Government. We have a Minister for Agriculture with whom I am satisfied, and with whom I am sure the country is satisfied. We have a Minister for Education who is a man of commonsense and who will not rush anything. We have a Government which, if left to itself, will do the right thing, but I object to the Government being rushed into this business by the pressure of people who are living in the clouds.

Mr. FARREN

What about the acreage?

Mr. COUNIHAN

There are thousands of acres there but they are all mountain land. If the Senator knew the Maam Valley and the Leenane district he would know that there would not be 100 acres of arable land in the whole lot. It would not graze a goose. If you put every one of those people into the position of a congest it would be most unfair. The House can consider what sort of civilisation and culture there would be in the Gaeltacht if every man was put in the position of a congest.

Doctor GOGARTY

I will second the amendment. It is a very difficult amendment to deal with, for economic progress and the Gaeltacht are two things very much opposed in fact. What I want to point out is that there are really three questions involved in the amendment. This is a moment which presents great opportunities for a lot of irrational and emotional patriotism. I do not intend to avail of the opportunity or to employ it in that way. We were told by Senator Dowdall and Senator Bennett that they were pushing an open door. One is at a loss to know then what is the meaning of bringing up the motion. They are pushing an open door, perhaps more than they admit, because to some extent this Gaeltacht Report is a dishonest one, to this extent: inasmuch as it makes no acknowledgment of the fact that nearly every one of the recommendations has already been exercised. There is nothing new in them. There are recommendations to deal with the congested districts. They published eighty-two recommendations which I thoroughly studied. They also published, as I think very unnecessarily, an extremely extravagant coloured map which was repeated in the map attached to the Report. When I got this satchel of expensive linen binding and the unnecessary percentages down to decimal points I cast up in my mind how much it cost to colour the map and how many homes in the Gaeltacht could have been coloured for the money. I agree with Senator Counihan that anyone who attempts to treat this matter in a rational way is looked upon as an enemy of the language. The places not coloured on the map are the economic places. If one proceeds to look elsewhere on the map it will be found that the enemy of the Gaelic language is progress. Against modern conditions I do not think it is anyone's intention to take precautions. If we are to get into the mentality and economic state in which the Gaeltacht is flourishing it means shutting off the market to which every country goes. We have competitors in the English market, Swedes, Danes and Dutchmen learning and perfecting themselves in the English language.

Mr. KENNY

And also in their own language.

Dr. GOGARTY

It is not so in Finland, where they speak Swedish more than Finnish. There is a Commission as to whether it would be better to speak the more generally-spoken language or the national language. I do not know if the Gaeltacht Commissioners have examined parallel conditions in countries where there is a native language and a predominant language. I would like to know what country has been examined. In Wales the prosperous people are chiefly Englishmen, managers of mines, etc. In Greece where there are five dialects— and they had to be dealt with by the Government—and there being no compulsory education, generally, education was held up for two years. They put a grammarian's language into being, and which, of course, the Greeks did not know, and whether they did or not it succeeded in sterilising the Greek genius completely. Not only technical matters but everything of importance in Greece is written in French. I do not think we should ignore the importance of language. Take the fallacies which underlie all this irrational enthusiasm about Gaelic. One fallacy is that the Gaelic-speaking parts of the country are the centre of civilisation. Nothing of the kind. These parts are the centre of the most amazing decadence. The Report of the Gaeltacht Commission means shortly this, that the prosperous East is to bear the expense of artificially nourishing the decadent West. The map shows that the Gaelic language parallels with the old Congested Districts Board areas, and nowhere else. I have nothing to say against the Gaelic language or Gaelic culture, but I do not want to get away with the idea that there is no possibility of being an Irishman except you are in the middle of the Gaeltacht. If we were all to go back to the inherited language some of the people of Dublin would be speaking Danish, some Norman-French, and the majority English, but none of them Gaelic, for there was not a single town founded in Ireland by the Gael. Another thing that has not been examined in the Report, and it is what any body of men with money to spend when confronted with such a Report would do first of all, and that is to make an inquiry into the character of the people.

The western part of Ireland, except on the seaboard, has not had any fresh blood for possibly two thousand years. We are asked now to rehabilitate them. The Land Commission has inherited the Congested Districts Board problem, and it is a problem that does not admit of answer in terms of land. There are nearly a quarter of a million congests. It comes to this, that if every landless man is to be dealt with, and one million acres are to be distributed, each person's proportion will be about 4¼ acres. The Congested Districts Board built harbours that are sometimes reached by a strong-winged sea-gull, and it endowed the congests with fishing-boats, but the Board forgot the fact that the congests are not fishermen. If there is a storm, they work on the farms, and if fine they go out to sea, and they only pay a couple of months' instalments on the fishing-boats. I have seen French poachers come in fishing in Irish waters in weather that was considered impossible by the native fishermen. These fishermen have no ice or proper means of sending their fish to the market. Just as the cattle markets are in England, the fishing markets are in Billingsgate and Grimsby, and the irony of it is that if we want fish we have to send over to England for fish that should be caught on the west coast of Ireland.

A large part of the Report, to give the Government its due, has been acted on. Money has been expended to the extent of some millions, but the problem will not be solved in terms of land, and still less will it be solved by endowing everybody who speaks Gaelic with about ten per cent. higher wages than people who do not, because what we will be suffering from, very shortly, is an extension of the Gaeltacht. That is to say, they will be putting the west further east, lessening efficiency.

It is a very significant thing that in the highly coloured map which accompanies the Report it is shown that in Clare, when is fairly rich and prosperous, there is a lower proportion of Gaelic-speaking people than in any other part of the West. I am not inspired with vindictiveness against Gaelic, but I say that the enemy of the native language is the march of progress. How are we to make up for that? At present there are three dialects. There is duplicate printing, which is a very expensive thing, and I am not sufficient of a scholar to suggest any method of over-riding the difficulty in combining the languages, but I know it is necessary. Whatever prosperity the eastern part of Ireland has it will hardly continue even if there is a combined dialectical language. As long as there is English spoken in the home, whatever is taught in the morning will be undone in the evening by the parents, and the greatest enthusiast has not suggested the shooting of mothers of English-speaking children.

You cannot have Gaelic unless you get away from every distraction. That means getting away from markets. If you spend £50,000,000 to-morrow and shut up the schools for five years when the money is spent you have again to seek your markets and be confronted with the economic conditions that put the Gael on the extreme limit of Europe. I said in another place that owing to the immense volumes of words it will be necessary to add to Gaelic it will be so diluted it will be more Esperanto than a language. Every one of modern Irish words, so far as I know, has been taken from Greek, or French, German and Italian. Modern Gaelic depends on the existence of the English language. Looking at the green Bills of the Seanad I see that I know enough of Gaelic for the Sugar Beet Bill thoroughly. One might think that it is because I do not know Gaelic is the reason why I am so little enthusiastic about it. Now, I suppose when one has spoken so much the only thing to make up for it is to apologise to the House for keeping it, and to suggest that when the Government have been asked to consider the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission, or such parts of it as they have not already undertaken, they should also be asked to let us know what were the causes that brought the language to such a poor pass. When a man in the Gaeltacht could only speak Gaelic he was called a dummy, because he could not speak English. That is called the inferiority complex. How are you going to get rid of that spirit? How are you going to get a man who is not a bi-linguist not to be looked down upon by a man who is? You will have to make the man who only knows English a dummy—in other words, we will be all dummies.

It is argued that there is compulsory everything in the schools. There is certainly compulsory arithmetic, compulsory writing, and compulsory reading, but inasmuch as competition for the life of a country is compulsory, whether we will it or not, it seems to me a very difficult and unwise thing to filter through the veil a language which is in the condition of being created, and make that the only avenue to the knowledge of the outer world for the children. It would be difficult enough if the teacher was sure of himself, but when the teacher does not know the language which is to be the vehicle of information, it is doubly hard on the children. Meanwhile, the child's home is conducted in a language which is different, so that at the end of, perhaps, three or four years of this experiment, we will be reduced to a state level with Wales. No one wants this country which began with such prospects to put itself deliberately in the position the western end of England is in— Wales. A number of people in Wales I have been speaking to did not like their own language. The culture of a country, I think, does not depend on its language. America has not sought to learn the Indian language, and there are 140,000,000 people speaking English in America. In the Scottish Gaelic movement they are too shrewd a people to keep away from business while learning Gaelic, or to think that the language will disappear if it is not heavily endowed. The most enthusiastic people in the support of the Irish language are not of the Gaelic clans, but men with names like Senator Westropp Bennett—thoroughly efficient men, who have plenty of energy and are not likely to let the language drop. They have far more enthusiasm, and are far more removed from the dummy attitude than the native himself. I think the language is very safe. There is an immense amount of history in those untranslated texts the Government has not yet noticed. But there is not an immense amount of literature. It is not right to assume that the Irish literature is equal, for instance, to that of France, Germany or England. It simply is not.

There are one or two extraordinary poems like the "Frenzy of Sweeney" but we have not a history that shows to advantage when compared with the history of modern European countries. That is not our fault. At the same time we must judge, if we are to judge it, in the light of the countries around us, because it is with these countries we are competing. If the Gaeltacht was self-supporting, if there were not railways, if there was no necessity to sell in other markets, if we were completely self-contained it would not matter what language we spoke. I am not against Gaelic, but I am against the idea that you are enhancing the value of a citizen if you are sufficiently enthusiastic, whereas you may really be undermining the State. These things will have to be cleared up and it is high time that they were. There are more competent people to speak on this motion than I am but I like to take upon myself the slings and the arrows, I am not speaking for any constituency. I learned Gaelic long before the Gaelic League came into existence and I think I know sufficient about the matters in that printed Report to lament its expense and to state that most of its recommendations have been already carried out.

I have not spoken on this amendment and did not intend to do so, but I should like to reply to Senator Sir John Keane. I am well acquainted with the valuation of land and I contend that the smallholder will not be placed in any such position as Senator Sir John Keane suggested. In my own county, farms with the valuation of £10 or £12 have an equal carrying capacity as other places where the valuation might be £60. I am convinced there is urgent necessity for re-valuation of the whole country as the present valuation is really not a test.

MINISTER for EDUCATION (Professor O'Sullivan)

Mr. CUMMINS

Well, to portions of it, at any rate. The Maam Valley was mentioned and other places. I do not know why Senator Counihan singles out the Maam Valley, but I have a shrewd suspicion that in his romantic days he went around that lovely country and made interesting associations in that quarter. Hence his solicitude for the Maam Valley. However, this amendment is the most extraordinary proposition that has ever been brought up in this House, and that it should be brought forward at all in this Assembly is astonishing. As for Senator Dr. Gogarty's speech, I do not think there is any national assembly where, if such a speech were made against the language of the country, the culprit would not be taken by the back of the neck and thrown into jail. No national assembly would permit the abuse of the language of the nation in such unmeasured terms as Senator Dr. Gogarty used here this afternoon in denouncing it. I appeal to this Assembly not for a moment to allow itself to be carried away by the flippant irrelevancies of the distinguished doctor. Whenever he comes to deal with the Irish language question, he never appears to deal with the matter seriously. He boasts of speaking the Irish language before the Gaelic League was established, but whatever his boast was in regard to the progress he made with the language, I fear that one of the principal things for which the language was promoted—the cultivation of the spirit of patriotism— did not have its effect on Senator Dr. Gogarty or he would not have come out to-day with this violent attack on the language.

The amendment should not get serious consideration for a moment in this House. The economic question is at the foundation of this problem. Those people in the Maam Valley, even if they are Irish speakers, must stand in the same position as any other people who possess a superfluity of land. I have some idea of the Maam Valley and the acreage there, and the acreage is a pretty sure index of the amount of wealth the grazing of these mountains affords. Thousands of sheep and cattle graze there, and I say that these lands should be just as much subject to the operations of the Land Act as lands in other places. It is not suggested that these people should be removed or evicted from their places. but it is suggested that they should abide by any action taken under the Land Act of 1923 just as any other people do. I have a distinct objection to the amendment being considered, and I hope it will be scouted out of this House.

Amendment put and declared defeated on a show of hands.

Mr. BAGWELL

I move:—

To delete all after the word "Council" and to substitute therefor the words "the desirability of taking steps to ascertain the wishes of the parents of the children concerned before introducing legislation on the lines of the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission."

Before saying what I have to say in support of my amendment, I might be permitted at the beginning to refer to some criticisms in advance of the original motion. It would be quite as easy for me to move a direct negative to the motion, but I do not do so because I read the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission. It is a very large document, and I am not equally acquainted with all parts of the subject with which it deals. I am, however, intimately acquainted with one portion of the Report and it is in regard to that part that I feel personal responsibility as a Senator. My amendment is therefore directed to that part of the Report and does not cover the whole of it. It seems to me that our function here as a Second Chamber is to exercise a wise, moderate, judicial and, where necessary, a restraining influence on such matters as come before us. It does not seem to me that this motion is wise or moderate, because it invites Senators to endorse without any reservation, the recommendation of a body of enthusiasts on a question surrounded by sentiment and by contention—a question which is at the same time of the most vital importance to the material welfare of the rising generation and to future generations in this country.

The views I am about to express are likely to be described as prejudiced. If they are that does not worry me very much, because everyone who is expressing an opinion, and who feels strongly on any subject of this kind, especially if it is one in which sentiment is mixed up, is bound to be denounced and one can always say that the people who hold the opposite view are also prejudiced. I have tried as far as possible to put myself in the position of people whose point of view is different to my own. We all in this House are Irishmen but we are Irish in varying degrees. I recognise that on the part of those whose point of view is more Irish than mine, it is not an unnatural desire to celebrate and emphasise the new found independence of this country by the development of a language which is peculiar to Ireland. While I personally think that that is unwise I certainly yield to none in my love of this country and in my desire to see its inhabitants more prosperous and more contented. There is room for difference of opinion as to how that could be brought about but I do not think that the recommendations in the Report, if carried out, are calculated to promote these desirable ends. On the merits of the question it seems to me that the recommendations are extreme and far reaching. On the educational side the object is to bring about a solid Gaeltacht in which the Irish language only will be used in all the affairs of life while on the administrative side the object is to foster and compel the use of the Irish language not only in the Gaeltacht but throughout the Free State by a mixture of artificial encouragement and coercion in the Government Departments, the Civil Service, Army, Civic Guards and in the legal, medical, and engineering professions.

One wonders what is all this for. Is it a gesture? I do not think it would be fair or reasonable to say it is. I do not think it is fair to say it is what is known in political affairs as a gesture. I think I should give credit to the members of the Commission for their sincerity and earnestness. I assume that the object underlying all the recommendations is a better development of Irish nationality by the establishment of the use of a language peculiar to Ireland. It seems to me that a great fallacy underlies the whole of that line of thought. Nationality is a very real thing and it may be a great thing but it is no more entirely dependent on a national language peculiar to a country, than on the homogeneity of a race. That is a big assertion, but it is a subject to which I have given a long study even before I became a Senator. It is a question in which I was always interested and I will give the House a few examples without going over the ground that has been covered by other speakers, particularly of that phase of it, with which I have been more or less intimately acquainted.

In the United States of America you find very large numbers of people who are not born in the States, who are brought up in other countries, and who spoke the language of these countries from infancy. There is no doubt that in the United States there is a very strong national feeling amongst all those people. Take a country on the other hand like Scotland.

In Scotland English is almost the universal language of the country. It is true that there are some parts of Scotland where Gaelic is largely spoken by some people, but they are undeniably the poorest and most backward parts of Scotland, and they still constitute a great economic difficulty which does not appear in those parts of the country where English is the spoken language. Take another country, Switzerland, where I have travelled widely. You have in Switzerland the German-speaking Swiss, the French-speaking Swiss, and the Italian-speaking Swiss. All have a strong national attachment to their country. I have yet to learn that there is any large body of German-speaking Swiss anxious to become German or of French-speaking Swiss anxious to become French, or Italian-speaking Swiss desirous of becoming Italians. It is the other way. They have a very keen national sense, and yet they do not speak their own language. There is another example in our own country. It is quite easy to see, as has been stated by the mover of the substantive motion, that the Irish language has been dying out in our time. That may be so. For a very long time the enormous majority of people in this country have to use English in their everyday life. It is a ridiculous thing to say that it is pushing an open door.

The political history of this country is a most remarkable example of strong national feeling. Why should we put round our necks a millstone which is going to place ourselves and the country in a worse position than we are in at present? I mention these countries as having a bearing on the language question and without wishing to carry it any further I will show that the subject is a very deep one. It is one on which nobody can profitably dogmatise. You would find great difficulty in defining what nationality is. The best definition of it I can find is one by one of the greatest thinkers of the most clear-thinking nation in the world, I refer to the French. This writer defined it in these words, which I have translated literally:—"To have done great things together and to have the will to do more of them, there is what makes a nation." I should say that we should do very much better to follow that wise and manly view than to endeavour to found nationality on peculiarity. Yes, peculiar in more senses than one.

It is well known that the real Irish language ceased centuries ago to move with the times. The result is that at present the language which is to a great extent an artificial one, and necessarily so, can only be made to fulfil the requirements of modern life by coining hundreds of words which cannot be found in the original tongue. I am not opposed to the voluntary learning of the Irish language, but what I am very much opposed to is what I conceive to be this very wrong idea of vicarious nationalism which is to be effected through the children and by no brain power, labour or exertion, but through the medium of the children. Good education is essential to national prosperity and——

Mr. BENNETT

On a point of order, we are talking about vicarious nationalism. Is not the whole policy of the Gaeltacht Commission declared to be the preservation of the national language?

CATHAOIRLEACH

That is not a point of order at all. Senator Bagwell is perfectly in order.

Mr. BAGWELL

I am quite prepared to answer any question raised by Senator Bennett, but I do not think that I should take up the time. It is true, as I have said, that good education is essential to national prosperity, but are the recommendations of the Gaeltacht Report practical for this purpose? Do they meet the requirements of modern life, and would they help to better equip the rising generation of children and future generations for the battle of life? Would the putting into force of this Report enable the children the better to earn their living? Would it enable them to rise in the world? There is where our responsibilities lie, and let us not hold that responsibility lightly. These things are far more important than any matter of sentiment.

Now, the present Gaeltacht districts on the whole are poorer and more backward than the other districts of Ireland. Can it be said that there is no connection between that fact and the fact that they are bilingual? I hold that the facts all point to there being a connection between the two. I think that the parents of many children, even in those districts themselves, Irish speakers, recognise that fact very strongly. The limitations of national school education, are very great. I think it is obvious that a child learning Irish cannot learn as much of other things at the time at its disposal. The child cannot learn two languages as easily as he could learn one, and with regard to acquiring knowledge, the child would acquire just as much knowledge by learning that knowledge in one language as by learning it in two. In the schools where the least amount of Irish is taught at present, out of twenty hours a week, 6½ hours are devoted to the teaching of the Irish language or to teaching them other subjects through the medium of that knowledge. I should like some Senators to imagine having to learn to spell and to count in two languages Children have done it, but I know it is very much more difficult than if they did it only in one language. Now, the compulsory subjects in the school are Irish, English, mathematics, history, geography, needlework, music, rural science or nature study. The children leave school at 14 or 15 years of age. The child is expected to become a jack of all trades in two languages, but he is master of none.

The task set the teachers is an impossible task for them. The country is still going steadily downwards if not approaching illiteracy, and the standard of practical education is becoming very low. Many parents notice that, but they are helpless. Parents come to me expressing the fear that their children will not be as well educated as they might owing to compulsory Irish, and as a consequence that they would be handicapped in after life. Now the motion of Senator Dowdall asks us to accentuate that. My objection to the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission is the compulsory element in it. This is a frightful injustice to children now growing up and to future generations. Let those whose parents wish them to learn Irish learn it. Let all the higher enthusiasts who are not children study it and make a literature and read it themselves and become proficient in it. But let us have no hand in compulsorily creating a Gaeltacht isolated from the rest of Ireland by adopting and speaking a different language from the rest. A bilingual Free State irremediably handicapped in the practical modern life is a thing I should be sorry to see, and I would be very sorry to see this Chamber taking any hand in it. Unless the people wish it—and this could be ascertained by a referendum —I do not think this teaching of Irish should be made compulsory. I know that numbers of the people who know Irish themselves have the greatest dread as to what is being done in the way of making Irish compulsory for their children. People do feel and think about their children and I think these people ought have the support of this House in the matter and that is why I put down this motion.

Sir JOHN KEANE

I rise to second it. Might I be allowed to make an observation later on—would I be in order?

CATHAOIRLEACH

Yes, it will be quite in order.

Colonel MOORE

We have heard a number of statements made about Irish and the Irish language. Of course, Senators are perfectly entitled to say what they like on both sides on this matter. The question is a difference of mind.

There are Senators on one side who regard the English as being a necessary language in all countries, and who would like to get all the world to speak English. English people have attempted to force their language on other countries where they were able to do it. Those who agree with me—and I think they are the majority of the people in this country now—are entirely of a different opinion. Certainly a great part of them are. They believe that the Irish language is a national necessity, and that the thoughts and ideas, progress and problems of the country depend to a great extent upon the language spoken. The language encourages a national feeling, and in all countries that I know the people have made the language of the country a very important part of their culture and of their progress. The Senator who has just sat down says that the poverty of the Irish-speaking districts is due to a certain extent to speaking the Irish language there. As a matter of fact, anybody who goes into the Gaeltacht and looks at the land down there, knows that the poverty is due to the poverty of the land. There are thousands of acres there as poor as possible, whereas you contrast that with the rich land of Meath or Kildare, and you see the difference. I do not think the statement the Senator has made is one that any thoughtful person would make for a second.

Another Senator stated that Irish must be a very artificial language. Might I ask him for a moment what kind of language is the English language? It is one of the most artificial in the whole world—partly Anglo-Saxon, partly Celtic, and partly something pre-English. And when that language began to progress, what did they do with it. They went either to the French, the Latin, or the Greek, and brought in scientific words wholesale from these languages. We heard here to-day the Irish language accused of having to borrow words from other languages, but I tell the Senators who speak in that way that there was never a language more mixed up than the English. The Irish is a pure language. It is not based on any language. What has been said here is an illustration of the evil of people talking about things of which they know nothing. There is another question which has been raised, and that is the undesirability of a language like the Irish from the economic point of view. The idea in the back of some people's minds is that only the language should be spoken which is spoken by many other people. The Senator quoted different countries in proof of this contention. He mentioned America, for instance. But we know that America is a compound of people from every part of the world. He also spoke about provinces like Quebec. Now, nine-tenths of the people of Quebec speak French. They came from a small body originally. They increased in numbers, and as they increased in numbers they made it a point to keep their language. They even insisted on it in their treaties.

Sir JOHN KEANE

Would the Senator tell us whether French is compulsory in all schools in Quebec?

Colonel MOORE

Most certainly, the people of Quebec speak French.

Sir JOHN KEANE

Is every child obliged to learn French?

Colonel MOORE

I do not think there is any great necessity for it. You might as well say that everybody here was compelled to speak English. Why, nine-tenths of the people of Quebec speak French. I have been in Quebec, and I know it. In Montreal the two languages are spoken. I remember on one occasion in Montreal asking a man the way in English and he said he did not know English. I asked another man later on the same day the way in French and he said he only knew English. The people in Quebec stick to their language. They refuse to learn English. To a great extent the country people there do not speak English at all. Both languages are equal in the Houses of Parliament there. The people follow the same course in other parts of Canada and America. The people from French Canada going down to America insisted on having their own language taught in the schools in the State of Maine and in other States. They insisted on it and after great opposition they carried their point. The matter is not quite so simple as the last Senator seems to think. The more you study it the more complex you will find it, and you will also find the more you study it that our view is agreed on throughout the world. Take for instance Bohemia. A few years ago the Czecho language was practically dead. It was about as much alive as the Irish is now in the Gaeltacht and even not so much.

The people of Bohemia saw that their life as a nation depended on that language. They banned themselves together to insist on the language being spoken, just as the Gaelic League did in Ireland. There all the people in trade spoke German just as the people in trade and in positions in this country speak English. The Bohemians, however, united and the time came when they got strong enough and they spoke their own language. They established a university of their own and finally they built up their nationality and conquered in the last few years, just as the people in Ireland won their liberties and built up their nationality with the spirit that the Gaelic League put into the people. A Senator made another statement which is equally wrong. He said there is a difficulty in speaking two languages. I happened to be in South Africa. I was treking round the country. Very often I would meet a Boer to whom I wanted to talk but I nearly always found that he could only talk Dutch. I used to call up a native waggon driver and tell him what I wanted to ask the Boer in English. He would turn round to the Boer and ask him in Dutch and he would translate it back into English for me. That was a common experience. Practically all these natives could speak to me in English and they knew Dutch as well and in addition their own language. These were Kaffirs. A Hottentot will do more. He will speak four languages.

I was in the South African Colony, and I met there the native Dutch people who spoke English so well that I would not know whether they were English or not. They spoke perfect English. All that goes to show that these difficulties are not so great. Now go over to Belgium, and in Belgium you will find they speak two languages. Belgium is only as big as Munster. You walk along the streets of Bruges and you ask a person in French the way to some place and he probably will not know what you are talking about. He knows Flemish. In Brussels half and half speak French and Flemish. Both are compulsory in the schools. Now this Flemish language is rather an out-of-the-way language and not spoken by so many people. Has bilingualism in Belgium prevented the Belgian people from being a rich people? Has it stopped their economic progress? For its size it is the richest and most progressive country in the world. In that country the people speak two languages and some of them cannot speak to each other. Both languages are there. A series of statements have been made here for which there is no foundation in fact. Another Senator who talks in a most flippant way tried to make out that the people of the Gaeltacht were more backward, less industrious and less intelligent than other people. Anyone who knows that part of the country—the Gaeltacht is where I was born—knows that is absolutely wrong in every way. The people of the Gaeltacht, when they spoke Irish only, were far better workmen and more intelligent than the people who lost the language since. At that time you could get carpenters, smiths, and mechanics of all sorts to do excellent work. Now since they learned English you cannot get men to drive nails in a box without splitting it. Anyone can converse with those people in the West who knows Irish and English. The great bulk of them can talk both languages as fluently as anyone in this House can.

It happened that I was at one time living in a town in the East of Ireland. To my great astonishment I found in that town there were a great many Irish native speakers. I was astonished, and asked "How does it come about that there are so many Irish speakers in this town?" and the reason, I was told, was this: the people of that town were cattle drivers and would do no work. They could not be got to produce butter even. The attendants in the shops had to be brought from the Gaeltacht. That was a remarkable state of affairs. The people in that district were no use, and they talked English very fluently.

Long ago we were told in this country if we only talked English we would become rich. Is that proved to be the fact? It is the very opposite. The more English we learned the poorer we got. We got poorer and poorer since that time. Our manufactures and our commerce died away.

We consider that language is identical with nationality in this country. The people of Ireland are determined to keep it up. I remember years ago, when the question of having compulsory Irish arose in the National University, we were all told the thing was utterly ridiculous, and that we were talking nonsense, that no one would have it, from one end of the country to the other; even the bishops joined in that, and issued a public statement blaming and speaking very strongly against those who had the courage to adopt any such suggestion. We went all over the country, preached our doctrine, and found everywhere we were met by a determination to have Irish spoken and compulsory. We found later that the county councils refused to give any contribution to the universities unless Irish was compulsory. We found, at the end, that bishops and archbishops had to bow to this and withdraw their opposition to compulsory Irish in the universities. The Archbishop of Dublin, who opposed it as a member at first, was the person who actually made Irish compulsory by his casting vote. Yet, we are told the Irish people do not want it. This sort of talk seems to me to be hardly worth discussing, and this House and the other House again and again have said that we intend to make the Irish language the speaking language of this country. However little English is spoken in the future, I care very little. I believe it will gradually fade away. Irish has, on more than one occasion, been driven back by the incoming English, but it has come back again. There was a time when no Irish was spoken in Dublin and Meath, and it came back until the only language spoken in Dublin and Meath was Irish. It went back again by compulsion, but it is coming back again. The best judges say that Irish is the one language in which the national conversation will be carried on.

Mr. KENNY

I think the strongest argument that can be used against those who oppose the compulsory element in the learning of the Irish language, in the recommendations of the Gaeltacht Commission, is one which will require some difficulty in answering. It is that the Irish language is our native language, with an emphasis on the "our." It is our native language recognised in the Constitution and given pride of place in the Constitution. If that statement does not appeal to any member of this Seanad then I have no further argument. There is something lacking in that member in his patriotism and nationality. There is something wanting in his make-up that prevents him appreciating what that statement denotes, that the Irish language is our language, that it is intimately associated with the origin and growth of the nation, that that is the medium of expression that the nation evolved through its inner consciousness. It is in its growth and development a language perfectly modulated to meet the growing needs and prosperity of that nation until ultimately it has grown to its present full dimension.

It is so intimately associated with the people of the country that you can- not disassociate it from them. Are we going to sacrifice all that has been built up for centuries? It is admitted by the highest educational authorities to be a pure language, and even apart from its utility for commercial purposes when included in the curricula of education, it is the very best mental training the Irish people could have. You have the opinion of educationalists who are more qualified to give an opinion, I venture to say, than Senators. That is all I have to say with regard to that matter. What I have said I think represents the views of the Senators immediately around me.

With regard to the compulsory element, with the permission of the House I will read extracts from a speech recently delivered showing how it affects the position in university colleges and schools to-day. It is the opinion of the experienced Rector of Belvedere College—Reverend Father Quinlan. "What does it mean?" he asked, when speaking at the annual dinner of the Belvedere Union. "That question has been practically ignored. Compulsory Irish does not mean that other subjects such as mathematics, history and geography must be taught through the medium of Irish. The Government will give grants to schools which do this efficiently. The Government does not force us to teach other subjects through the medium of Irish. Therefore, what does compulsory Irish mean? It means," he continued, "that pupils will be bound to study Irish for about three hours per week between twelve and sixteen years of age—that is for the Intermediate Certificate. It is not compulsory for the Leaving Certificate." Three hours per week compulsory study of Irish! That is all it means. He further adds: "Belvedere introduced compulsory Irish some years ago." It did not lower the standard. It rather raised the standard. As a result the number of pupils were almost doubled in two years. Parents eagerly sent their boys to the College.

This amendment suggests that parents should be consulted. We have no fear of that. Senator Moore said that if a Referendum were taken to-morrow it would be largely in favour of the continuation of this study of the language, even with a slight element of compulsion. If we are to gauge to what extent the compulsory study of an alien langauge is a bar to the prosperity of a country—if it is any bar at all—we have only to look back at the history of this country when compulsory English was introduced. As we know, boys attending the national schools then, who spoke only Irish, had a notch put in a stick that was hanging round their necks every time they spoke Irish. What was the result of forcing the English language on this country? At the time that was taking place Ireland was fairly prosperous. It had factories, home industries and employment. It had perhaps a fairly low standard of living, but it was a prosperous country, agriculturally and industrially. When compulsory English was forced on the country it simply beggared it inside half a century. I think that argument clinches the matter.

Sir J. KEANE

Senator Kenny referred to the virtues of experts, and wished us as plain men to be guided in our judgment of public affairs by experts. Personally I have a great suspicion of experts.

Colonel MOORE

Is not the Senator an expert himself?

Sir J. KEANE

The late Lord Salisbury who, in spite of his politics, was a very wise and learned man, said that according to the soldiers nothing is safe; according to the theologians nothing is right; and according to someone else all require to be diluted with a sound mixture of commonsense. Rightly or wrongly I must bring my commonsense to bear so far as the economic condition of the Gaeltacht is concerned.

I see fundamental difficulties in improving the people there. They are on poor land and in a district with very little natural resources. Fishing is probably their greatest natural resource. Anything that could be done should be done to improve their material condition. As people indirectly responsible for the conduct of the Government and for the financial credit and security of the country, we want to know what it involves. You cannot deal with practical things in generalities. I think we are all agreed that the economic condition of the Gaeltacht would require some form of subsidy. It cannot stand on its own. I think we will all be prepared to concede that. The British Government conceded it when it established the Congested Districts Board which, for some reason, was abolished. I do not think that that makes much difference as the work will go on just as well under the Land Commission, and there is a great deal to be said for merging these boards under one body. When we come to look to the Gaeltacht for inspiration, as a practical people we find none of the recommendations supported by any figures of cost. The report to which all this consideration is given is one on which much pains have been bestowed and which is liberally supported by appendices of the most bewildering statistical tables. The cattle are classified in groups of valuation, and one almost wonders if the cows low differently there to elsewhere. While that is praiseworthy, there is a specific paragraph which says: "We have not been able to consider the financial recommendations."

Colonel MOORE

I suppose that is due to the Government?

Sir J. KEANE

Not necessarily. The mover of the motion should have assisted us. We have been asked to sign a blank cheque. It is awfully difficult to eradicate suspicion in some quarters, but I honestly and sincerely say that I am in favour of doing what can be done practically, and within our resources, to improve conditions in the Gaeltacht. At the same time I would like to know what is to be done. The main part of the Report is cloudy idealism. To put it in this way it sets out to use a word from the modern communistic school to set up a cell through which Irish should be spread throughout the country, and to put this language in a privileged and protected position. I have sympathy with Senator Kenny's point of view, because it arouses his enthusiasm. He feels, no doubt, inspired by a sort of holy passion for the Gaeltacht. We are a democratic country. I move amongst the people and I do not find this consuming fire that he refers to. I find complaints from the plain people up and down the land that their children are being handicapped. These people are not what might be called Anglo-Saxon; they are ordinary working people.

I cannot see any objection in submitting this matter to a Referendum. It is very often difficult to provide a suitable subject for a Referendum. This is one in which the question might be asked: "Are you, or are you not in favour of Irish being made compulsory in the primary schools?" The answer is "yes" or "no." I think it is the duty of the Government to do that. They never had a mandate on this subject. I know that they were carried away a great deal by a lot of pre-Treaty influences. In times of revolution we all know that things are said that cannot be carried out afterwards. This compulsory language has been incorporated in our education system and a lot of harm in my opinion has been done. It is proposed to go further and make a series of close boroughs by reserving various appointments in the public service for Irish-speaking citizens of the Gaeltacht. I object to that on the same principle that I objected to the policy of protection. If this language has such power, and has such an effect on stimulating intelligence, why cannot those brought up in the language get into the service on their merits? On their own showing it should be easy for bilingual students to make their way. It is reactionary and unjustifiable to import into a profession a class that cannot get in by competition.

There is also the extraordinary proposal to make this language a test for the professions, medicine, law and the Bar. There is no mention of the Church. I am told that the explanation is that it is already compulsory with the Orders. I have not heard that confirmed, but the Church is omitted from the list. It is a policy of looking inwards, cutting ourselves off from the world and modern progress. It is like trying to stem the incoming tide. Is that commonsense in an era of wireless, aviation and the League of Nations, when the tendency is to make nations more cosmopolitan? We have the eight hours convention and every other international arrangement and we are getting away from the petty national outlook. You can retain your own nationality without shutting yourselves inwards. If I thought it was going to succeed or to make the country richer, or to add to the country's cultural activities—as no civilisation is complete without culture —I would be impressed, but I fail to see that in any of these aspects it is going to do that.

I think to accept this Report blindly would be a great mistake. We should divide the economic from the educational, and find out what the people really want with regard to education. I am scheduled myself as being practically in the Gaeltacht. I know everybody in a village. I never hear Irish spoken there now, but the schedule says that 80 per cent. of the people in the village are Irish speaking. I have tested them since the Report, and I think that if the census was compiled by independent people it would not bear out the figures in the Report. In my young days fishermen there spoke Irish. Now you hear the fishermen shouting at one another in this foreign tongue. For that reason I think we ought to get ourselves clear on this matter. We want to restrain our sentiment and bring this thing down to the acid test of reality. The proposal is not democratic. We must realise that the people are sovereign and our masters, and it is they who are to decide this issue. There is no test, as Senator Kenny suggested, in mixing it up with a general election or licensing reform or other questions. You should put a clear-cut issue to the people by referendum, and get the result. I am as anxious as anybody to abide by that referendum.

Mr. BENNETT

I think a great attempt has been made to queer the pitch in this matter. We were discussing the Gaeltacht Commission, dealing completely with Gaelic-speaking or partly Gaelic-speaking people. We have travelled all over the world, practically, and taken people of every other type of nationality, and in addition most unjustly tried to introduce here the question of compulsory Irish outside the Gaeltacht. The Gaeltacht Commission Report was absolutely concerned with people who were either Irish speaking or partly Irish speaking. I put it to the Senators, is it not sufficient evidence that these people, who are interested at all events in the study of Irish, who are Irish speaking, must have taken some pains to acquire Irish, and therefore their desire was to be Irish speaking unless the means were withheld from them to acquire any other language? We cannot shut our eyes to the fact that not only was the means withheld from them, but every means that could be devised was tried to make them learn another language. In spite of that, they have not acquired the other language. Is not that sufficient proof to any jury, without a referendum, that these people want the Irish language and are determined to have it? I think this amendment should be strongly opposed.

MINISTER for EDUCATION (Professor O'Sullivan)

Senator Bagwell, and subsequently Senator Sir John Keane, sprang with amazing agility from the Gaeltacht to the Galltacht and back again. I was not sure whether they were referring to the Gaeltacht or not. In a mild way Senator Sir John Keane, for instance, asked for a referendum on the Gaeltacht Report on the question of compulsory Irish in primary schools, which is not the question which we are now supposed to be discussing. The resolution is one thing, and the amendment is another, and I suggest that the speeches made on the three amendments are a third. If I were to go into a defence of the whole Government policy on the question of Irish, I could not finish in the time I would like to finish. Confining myself to the Report, resolution and amendment, I cannot follow Senators on one side or the other, not merely through Europe but right through the world. Language may be always a necessary constituent of nationality, but I suggest it is absurd to think or say that very often it is not a powerful help and stimulant and a most important factor in the nationalism of countries. If Senator Bagwell referred to Irish nationalism to prove his point, I suggest he has misread the Irish history of the last thirty years if he thinks language had no connection with Irish nationalism, nor would I think it was quite safe for him to quote the French as a clear thinking people. I admit they are the most so in the world. They are also very realistic politicians. I suggest that their policy as regards the language, for instance, in Alsace-Lorraine, would hardly back up all he is prepared to say regarding the voluntary acquisition of languages. The Senator said that we should become practical. I want to be thoroughly practical and as little sentimental as anybody in this House, and it is because I think that the Irish language is a practical issue in every sense, even from the bread and butter point of view it should hold the position we put it into in our system of education. There may be other grounds, but confining ourselves to that alone, the acid test of reality, as one of the speakers said, I am quite prepared to agree that what we are doing now should be judged by that. I have heard charges about the growth of literature and the lowering of the standards, but I have heard these charges again and again, often backed up by figures that applied to between 1900 and 1920, and convincingly backed up almost. These figures were taken from that period, long before the policy that is so objectionable was put in force. In his speech the mover of this amendment went much further than most of the opponents of what we regard relatively as compulsory Irish. He wants not merely that there should not be compulsory Irish outside the Gaeltacht, but that practically speaking where it is still alive it should be driven out of the country. I am very careful when a speaker dealing with the Irish language prefaces his speech by saying: "I am not an opponent of the language." I am afraid of what the rest of the speech will be when he prefaces it with these words. There was one phrase in the Senator's speech, if I heard it correctly—I hope it is simply a slip—in which he said: "We are all Irishmen, but Irishmen in different degrees." I wonder if the great country to which he referred across the water would take that as a definition of American nationalism?

Amendment put.

The Committee divided: Tá, 11; Níl, 19.

Tá

John Bagwell.
William Barrington.
Samuel L. Brown.
John C. Counihan.
Countess Desart.
Sir Nugent Everard.
Sir John Griffith.
Arthur Jackson.
Andrew Jameson.
Sir John Keane.
James Moran.

Níl

T. Westropp Bennett.
Patrick J. Brady.
William Cummins.
J.C. Dowdall.
Thomas Farren.
Thomas Foran.
Henry Seymour Guinness.
Cornelius Kennedy.
Patrick William Kenny.
Francis McGuinness.
James MacKean.
John MacLoughlin.
William J. Molloy.
Colonel Moore.
John T. O'Farrell.
Michael F. O'Hanlon.
Bernard O'Rourke.
Mrs. Wyse-Power.
Thomas Toal.

Motion put and declared carried.

Mr. GUINNESS

Might I be allowed to correct my vote. I intended to vote for the amendment.

CATHAOIRLEACH

We will simply record that you stated you voted in the wrong Lobby. I declare the amendment lost.

Mr. MacLOUGHLIN

On the question of the original motion I desire to make a few observations. Donegal being one of the number of counties in the Gaeltacht, there is intense agitation there that the recommendations of the Commission should be put in force. In considering this Report of the Commission I think we should bear in mind that the late Congested Districts Board, numbering amongst its members very able and brilliant men, was set up for the special purpose of solving this problem, and after labouring 32 years and expending 9½ millions of money the problem still remains with us to-day. I do not mention this for the purpose of belittling or decrying the excellent work done by the Congested Districts Board. I merely mention it to show the magnitude of the work before the members of the present Government, who, if they are to carry out in their entirety all the recommendations of the Gaeltacht Commission, have been set a herculean task.

Of course we all deplore the evils of emigration, but the fact must be faced that large populations cannot be maintained in these barren congested areas under modern conditions and expectations. These people are the victims of economic evils for which it is very hard for any Government to find a remedy, and it is an impossibility to find it with the rapidity which some benevolent people demand. While the Gaeltacht report contains many valuable recommendations, and many not so valuable, I doubt whether if they were all adopted they would achieve the end in view. John Bright said of the Land Act of 1870 that it was "a great plaster to a great sore," but he did not pretend that it was a cure for the cancer underneath. In saying this I must not be taken as favouring a do-nothing policy. I hold that the Government should do everything possible, having regard to the resources at their command, to mitigate the hardships that never more than now are pressing upon these poor people.

I consider that the time has come when the Government should give the same attention to the economic side of this question as they have already given to the language side. It seems to me that everything possible is at present being done for the language. Some people think that too much is being done for the language and object to Irish being made a compulsory subject in the schools. We are told that the general education of children is adversely affected by the inclusion of Irish in the school programme, and that the children are spending their time in learning what is of little use to them afterwards. I am not a bigoted or fanatical supporter of compulsory Irish any more than I am of compulsory Euclid or compulsory Algebra. It seems to me, however, that Irish is just as fascinating a study and as useful afterwards to the average child as either Geometry or Algebra. In fact, I have been told by many teachers that the study of Irish makes children brighter and more fully develops their intelligence than either Algebra or Euclid. This has caused me to reflect that if in the past instead of the fifth proposition in Euclid we had the Fifth Book of O'Growney as the "Asses' Bridge," it might have made a lot of difference to the commonsense of the country.

Those who cry out against compulsory Irish in the schools should remember that it is the paramount duty of our first native Government to restore our national language, which, in the past, was killed by the schools and by the public opinion cultivated by the ruling and richer classes that it was a badge of inferiority to be able to speak Irish. And in this task the Government should have the support of every patriotic Irishman, if only to ensure that future generations of Irishmen would not be liable to the taunt levelled at this generation by Mr. Lloyd George when he said we could not claim the status of a nation when we could not speak our own language as the Welsh did. Considering the amount of leeway that had to be made up I think the Government took the most practical step in the task of restoring the language by putting Irish in the forefront of their schools programme. If this was followed up by continuation classes for pupils, from the fourth standard upwards, and for boys and girls who had left school, and who, as well as having their education in Irish completed, could be taught practical agriculture and allied subjects, good results would be achieved both for the language and for industry. The money spent on a scheme of continuation classes would be much better spent than by endeavouring to propagate Irish by bilingual printing of Statutes and Agendae.

Accordingly I approve of the recommendation made in paragraph 22 in favour of a scheme of rural continuation education, but I regret to have to disagree with the recommendations made with regard to the use of Irish in administration. These recommendations seem to me to go too far. I think it is rather a tall order to replace forthwith those at present occupying positions by competent Irish speaking officials in the Post Office, old age pensions work, Gárda Síochána, Department of Agriculture and Land Commission, as well as dismissing over 1,000 school teachers and insisting that only Irish speaking court officials and District Justices shall, in future, be appointed to Irish speaking and partly Irish speaking districts. In my opinion it would be practically impossible to carry out so extensive a replacement and to recruit all these services from the ranks of Irish speakers. Of course I quite understand the zeal and the patriotic motives that urge these drastic measures. I know that what the members of the Gaeltacht Commission fear is that the Gaeltacht will have disappeared before the language will have spread from it at the rate the people are leaving, forced by the impossibility to make the hardest livelihood because the sources outside their bit of land are dried up. It was these that made living possible in the past—cottage industries, fishing, kelp-making, etc., and these have all now disappeared.

Another great loss is the closing of the Scotch and English harvest to the migratory labourers. These men were small farmers, or sons of small farmers, and they went every year to the Scottish and English harvests to earn, under very trying and degrading conditions, sufficient money with which they could return to pay their rents and shop debts. Owing to the organised prejudice against Irish migratory labour, especially in Scotland, this source of income is now gone, and I suggest that its loss might, to some extent, be compensated for if a scheme were formulated for the improvement and reclamation of the land in the congested areas. Congestion in the worst parts of Inishowen might be much relieved by schemes of reclamation, draining, and the deepening of rivers. The extent of arable land would be enlarged, and the remainder of the farms might be improved. No doubt some migration might be called for, but with the enlarged arable ground very many of the small farms could be made economic. Compared with other counties, the amount of untenanted land available for distribution in Donegal is small.

We have, however, got quite a lot of land held by "absentee" tenants and others, who, instead of tilling it themselves, prefer to let it in conacre. The land is auctioned on credit, and is bought at prices which amount to a super rack-rent by labourers who have no work because the lands are not tilled by the owners, and by "congests" who are unable to grow sufficient produce for their cattle on their own uneconomic holdings.

Five and six pounds an acre is given for this land, the rent of which does not average ten shillings an acre to its owners under the Purchase Acts, and eight to ten times that rent is paid by those labourers and "congests" who are lucky if they realise what pays the auction bills after giving their labour for nothing. As a matter of fact during the bad harvest that preceded last year they lost both crops and labour but had to pay the bills. Senator Counihan says it is most unjust and disastrous to evict large farmers from their homes. I quite agree, but it is still more unjust and disastrous to allow large farmers in congested counties who will not till their land to let it at exorbitant prices to poor "congests" and labourers who should be employed on it. This class of land should be at once acquired and divided up.

In connection with the dividing up of land and the carrying out of other works which the Government may think necessary for the improvement of the Gaeltacht I am altogether against the setting up of an expensive new board with a secretary and inspectors as, I think, the present officials and machinery at the disposal of the Government are quite sufficient. With regard to the revival of cottage and rural industries, here again, I venture to differ with the recommendations made in the Report of the Commission. I say, with all deference to the members of the Commission, that in my opinion their recommendations are impracticable. For instance they recommend the management by the State of certain industries, and the setting up of central depôts by the State for the purpose of selling the products of these industries.

I confess that I do not believe in state-managed industries nor in any industry that has not behind it the driving force of personal initiative and personal interest. I think the experience of most people is that State-managed industries are generally failures. Indeed this is to some extent admitted by the Gaeltacht Report, as it says in paragraph 172 that, "considering the supply of local labour the Commission finds that in some districts the State-managed industries are not as flourishing as might be expected." But the Report goes on to attribute this result to the system of marketing, and to remedy this, it recommends the establishment of a central depot to procure and distribute raw materials, with agents in America, France and Great Britain to sell the finished articles. This looks perfect in theory, but I am afraid it would not work so smoothly in practice. I might mention one difficulty that occurs to me. That is that when these products of our rural industries seek an entrance to the markets of America and France they would find their entrance barred by a high tariff wall. I do not think the Commission fully realised the difficulties that beset the successful carrying on of small industries in rural areas at the present time. When the Report suggests the re-establishment of cottage industries in the Gaeltacht, it seems to have overlooked the change effected by the industrial and protective legislation of the past twenty years.

The Commission does not seem to be aware of the fact that there is now a Trades Board which compels practically the same wages to be paid in the Gaeltacht of Donegal as in Houndsditch, and as long as this prevails and no allowance is made for the cost of transit of the goods and for other drawbacks and disabilities from which industries suffer that are carried on in remote districts, or for the difference between the cost of living in these districts and cities, it is hard to expect the re-establishment of cottage industries on a paying basis. Of course, I know that this class of labour was exploited, ruthlessly exploited, in the past, and that legislation was necessary to counteract this. I am not complaining of this, nor am I making a case for low wages. I am simply stating facts and endeavouring to show how the Trades Board Act operates against cottage industries, and that the Trades Board is refusing the application to these industries of a principle which trades unions admit in the case of other industries— different rates for different districts.

In the printing trade printers in Omagh are paid 10/- per week less than in Derry. Just the opposite occurs in the case of shirtmaking. The position in regard to that industry is that the rate of wages in the rural districts of Donegal is fixed at 4/- per week more than what is paid in the large factories in Derry City. The effect of this has been to kill the best cottage industry in Donegal. Although the 15 per cent. tariff on shirts led to the establishment of several new factories in Donegal, it had no effect on cottage shirtmaking. The new factories were established with modern machinery in towns where they could have power and light and be near to the railway, while the factories which had been flourishing in the congested areas before and during the war have been left derelict and idle, with the result that the most expert shirtworkers in the country have emigrated. I am surprised then that there is not a single word said in the Gaeltacht Report about this aspect of the case, which is the chief factor in the difficulty of reviving cottage industries.

Similarly in their review of the causes of failure in the home-spun industry—by which at one time £11,000 was earned by its workers in one year —which the Report states is now approaching extinction, with "600 looms and 1,500 spinning wheels idle," the Commission, while giving three causes which contributed to its decline, omitted to state the principal cause, which in my opinion is the closing by higher tariffs of the Continental and American markets, where a good trade was done before the war. Having failed to diagnose the real cause, they fail to prescribe the cure by which the industry may be re-established. They recommend an inspector with expert knowledge and assistants to act under him as organisers and instructors and the granting of loans for setting up carding and finishing mills.

These recommendations are all excellent, especially the last, if we did not remember that three-fourths of the carding and finishing mills in the country were idle. The depression in the home-spun industry is due to the same causes as the depression in all other industries in the country, and until a more intensive industrial policy is developed in the rest of the country it is futile to attempt to industrialise the Gaeltacht. It is just like putting hot jars to the feet of a patient suffering from weak circulation. The country is suffering from weak circulation in its industrial and economic life, and I am surprised that Senator Dowdall, when recommending that this Gaeltacht Report should be put into force, urged what are mere palliatives instead of prescribing a good dose from that Cork prescription which they tell us would restore the bodily vigour and send the blood of industry tingling through the country's veins until it reached even the extremities of the Gaeltacht.

There is one matter I wish to mention, as I see a member of the Executive Council present and I want to draw his attention to it—the matter of the assets of the Congested Districts Board. It has been asserted in the Press and at meetings held to urge that the recommendations of this Report be put into operation, that on the handing over of the Congested Districts Board to the Free State Government there was a sum of one and a half millions in cash handed over from the British and that this money lies available for use in various stricken areas. I would urge on the Minister that in view of the fabrications current the Government should set out in a White Paper the true story of the finances of the Congested Districts Board and its assets, from the Treasury ledgers. Moreover, I would suggest that there should be published as from the date the Congested Districts Board was established in 1891 until now, the cash expended out of the nine and a half millions in the various baronies and parishes and the practical results achieved by this expenditure.

I would also draw attention to the fact that while the Report avoids estimating the financial effect of putting its recommendations into force, the question mainly is one of £ s. d. and and while one section is shouting for expenditure a much more formidable voice is raised against the imposition of taxation. Business men demand the reduction of income tax and the lowering of duties on alcoholic beverages. The Government must cut its coat according to its cloth and I cannot overlook the fact that the old Board, with the British Exchequer at its back, was operating thirty-two years before responsibility was thrown scarcely four years ago on new men under a new system and these men are now accused of having left the problem nearly as unsolved as their predecessors. When I reflect that the Congested Districts Board consisted of men like his Eminence Cardinal O'Donnell, the late Bishop Kelly of Ross, Father O'Hara, Sir Horace Plunkett, and W. L. Micks, with British Chief Secretaries as ex-officio members, and that there was no such outcry against their administration as has been raised against the Free State, I am inclined to recommend patience to the more ardent critics of the Government.

Sir JOHN GRIFFITH

I only rise to explain the reason why I cannot support the motion of Senator Dowdall. I will try to be as brief as I can. The motion seems to me, at least, to be almost an instruction to the Government. If it had been put in the form of a desire or a request to the Government to consider the Report carefully and quickly, I should have cordially supported it, but there is a sort of mandatory order to them to legislate in accordance with the recommendations. I am not sure that Senator Dowdall really meant that himself but the words seem to me to imply that. There are so many items in the Report on which I cannot agree that I cannot vote for the motion. The effect of the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission is such and it is such a complex document, dealing with such a variety of subjects and opening up such fields of controversy that if it were discussed in detail in the Seanad I scarcely believe that there are ten members who would accept the Report as a whole and yet we are asked "to impress on the Executive Council the necessity of introducing at an early date legislation on the general lines of the Report."

I wish to state briefly my personal reasons for not supporting it. I object to the Report because it proposes coercion of the worst description, worse, I think, than any that was in force under British rule. The knowledge of Irish seems to be the necessary qualification for residents in these miserable districts. You are asked to penalise anyone who does not actively support the compulsory teaching of Irish in these districts. Teachers are to be displaced and others bribed, while English-speaking families are to be evicted. That the Commissioners themselves appear to expect that the inhabitants being so treated will be very turbulent is evident, for they recommend in paragraph 36 "That all members of the Civic Guard with a good knowledge of Irish be transferred forthwith to the Gaeltacht." In recommendation No. 47 they ask "that at least one brigade of the Army, for which Irish shall be the language of administration and training, be formed of Irish speakers." At the end of the Report there are given what is known in engineering circles as graphs, and there are also maps attached.

All these things seem to me to show that very careful investigation of this document should be made. There is the formation of these exclusively Irish districts. The whole intention is to have a greater percentage of Irish speakers. I am not averse to the Irish language, but its growth must not be by coercion. I say that because I happen to be a Welshman born and bred without a trace of any contaminating blood, either Irish, Scotch, English, Anglo-Saxon or Norman. It is a little more than 100 years ago that my mother crossed over to Dublin to be educated. She was then a girl, 12 years old. She did not know a word of English. She could only speak Welsh. She came here to Dublin to learn English and came back. I have in my own establishment some four or five young women who are Welsh. You can hear them speaking and singing in Welsh. When we go away from home they write to us in English. That is the type of Irish people that I should like. I should like the Irish to be brought in voluntarily certainly, taught in the schools and not under threats. That was how we spread our own language in Wales. It holds its own now in the face of tremendous difficulty. We are bounded on one side by Ireland and on the other side by England and yet throughout the whole country there is a very considerable portion who can speak both English and Welsh and write English and Welsh well. These are the chief reasons why I cannot give my assent to this motion of Senator Dowdall's. There are other portions of the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission which I would most cordially support. If it were possible to divide up the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission I would say to the Government: "Use your own discretion," because I have great confidence in them. On my part I think I can say that we are all here particularly anxious with regard to the welfare of the people of the Gaeltacht. There are statements in the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission with which I am in full sympathy. I refer to those dealing with the economic development of the Gaeltacht. Throughout the section of the Report devoted to this subject it is quite evident that there is a desire to resuscitate the C.D.B. again. All that can be said against the C.D.B. was that it had not finished its work when it was dissolved. The suggestion in the Report requiring the members of the medical, legal and engineering profession practising in Ireland to have a knowledge of the language is simply ridiculous and unworkable.

Sir NUGENT EVERARD

Professor O'SULLIVAN (Minister for Education)

Perhaps I might say a word about the attitude of the Government. I doubt if legislation will be necessary for most of the matters in the report at all. If the words "so far as may be practicable and reasonable" will meet your ideals I am satisfied.

The general attitude of the Government towards this Commission is quite clear. There used to be a tradition in another country about the setting up of a Royal Commission that it was done with the idea of shelving a problem. I do not think that this Government has ever set up any Commission with a view to shelving a problem, or having set up a Commission, showed any desire to shelve the findings of any Commission on any question. Therefore, if there is in the mind of any Senator a fear that we are trying to shelve this problem, I may tell him that that fear is unfounded. The difficulty about this Report of the Gaeltacht Commission is that there is such a variety of problems raised therein, and some of them of the greatest importance.

As Senator MacLoughlin pointed out, that is a problem that has been confronting the Congested Districts Board for over thirty years. It would not be reasonable to expect that a few months after the receipt of the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission the Government would be in a position straight away to define its policy as to the eighty-two resolutions which are put forward in this Report. There is hardly a Department of the Government which is not affected by some particular resolution of the Gaeltacht Report. There might be possibly an exception in the case of the Department of External Affairs. Every other Department of the Government is not unaffected. The Government, on receipt of the Report, took the reasonable step of seeking the views of the different Departments concerned, not about the general policy of the Report, but about the detailed effect of the Report, how far they could be presumed practical and reasonable, and what cost may be involved. All those things must be considered. Senators must easily understand that they require a considerable deal of time. The reports are now practically in and the Government will be able to give this enormous and important Report the consideration it requires.

There are many recommendations in that Report to which Senators will probably have no objection; others undoubtedly raise very important questions. Some of them are even revolutionary. I may instance one connected with my Department. There is the position of the teachers in the Gaeltacht who do not know Irish. The Commission's method of dealing with them may not be the best way to solve the particular problem that in that particular instance the Commission had before it.

It is a matter that requires consideration, whether in the long run it might do more harm to the language than good. There are many problems of that kind that do arise, first of all whether certain resolutions are the best to achieve the aim the Commission has before it. All that requires detailed investigation, and the Departments of the Government have given that the investigation that everyone will agree the Report deserves. It is not a Report that could be considered and then adopted or rejected. It requires, owing to the important issues that arise, and the life and death problem from the national point of view with which it deals, the greatest possible consideration. I can assure the Seanad that the Government will give it, and has given it, the greatest consideration. More than that I am not in a position to say at the moment.

Senator MacLoughlin raised the question of the ghostly £1,500,000 that was supposed to be handed over in cash by the Congested Districts Board to the present Government when the change in government took place. I say "ghostly" because it never had any existence whatever. The Church Fund was hypothecated to various sources. Over £1,000,000 went to the Intermediate, £1,300,000 went to the Teachers' Pension Fund, and so on; £20,000 went to the Royal University, as it then was; after that came a charge of 2¾ per cent. interest for the C.D.B. Subsequently, other charges were put on, with the result that the fund was hopelessly insolvent. There was no cash to be given away. The best way would be to follow the lines suggested by the Senator and have a White Paper published.

Seanad Éireann díospóireacht - Thursday, 10 Mar 1927