I move:
That this Bill be now read a Second Time.
Private Business. - National Maternity Hospital, Dublin (Charter Amendment) Bill, 1936— Second Stage.
I second.
With your permission, Sir, I would put it to the House that this Bill might, with advantage, be postponed until next week. The report of the Hospitals' Commission is only out at the moment, and some of us would like to read the report in conjunction with this Bill. Only a few copies of the report, I understand, have yet been published, and those that have been distributed were only sent out on Saturday or Monday. I suggest, therefore, that the House might consider it advisable to leave this matter over until next Wednesday, or whatever time the House meets next week.
Has the House any objection to the postponement of this Bill until next week?
I submit, Sir, that the Second Reading of the Bill should be carried to-day. I agree with Senator Dowdall that it is purely a domestic matter. As everyone knows, there are three hospitals particularly concerned here: The Rotunda Hospital, The Coombe Hospital, and National Maternity Hospital. The National Maternity Hospital started in a small way, and is now one of the best equipped hospital in Europe, and the Master in charge is one of the most brilliant men that this city has ever turned out—and it has turned out very many excellent men in this kind of hospital work. The staff there is second to none and the training of young nurses and young doctors, who have to go through the whole of Ireland, is first-class in every way. There is a certain element of danger creeping into this country, and unless the teaching of young nurses and young doctors is founded on truly Catholic principles, I am afraid this country will go to the bad. Consequently, I think that the sooner we accede to the request of the National Maternity Hospital, the better it will be for the country, and I think the Bill ought to be given a Second Reading to-day.
I should like to say, Sir, that I have no objection whatever to the Bill, and I am quite satisfied to accept all that Senator O'Sullivan has said. I have no objection to the Bill in principle, but I feel that there may be certain points in it on which Senators would wish to express their views, and, in view of the fact that the report of the Hospitals' Commission is only just out, I suggest that it would not be unreasonable to postpone the Second Reading for a week, so as to give Senators an opportunity of fully considering the report. I have spoken to Senator Dowdall, and I do not think he has any objection to having the Second Reading postponed for a week.
I take it, Senator, that it is purely a question of whether or not we should take the Bill this week, and that it has nothing to do with the merits of the Bill?
I should like to say that I have served on a number of joint committees in connection with private Bills and that, in my opinion, no other Bills get so exhaustive or such fair consideration. That has been my experience in connection with private Bills. I think it will be agreed that, when these private Bills come before the joint committees, we all put our politics in our pockets——
Quite right, Senator.
——and the details of the Bills are very closely scanned. It seems to me, from my experience of these committees, that their chief object has been to produce as good a Bill as possibly can be turned out, and I do submit to Senator Connolly that any points which may properly be raised can be raised in that joint committee. The Bill is the result of a select committee representative of the National University and other distinguished colleges and, in view of what Senator O'Sullivan has said and of some representations that have been made to me, I think that, while there is some opposition, the opposition has not come openly to the surface and, I think, with regard to the point made by the Minister as to the advisability of postponement to enable a better consideration to be given to the Bill, that any difficulties can be more properly adjusted in the joint committee than by means of any discussion on the Second Reading. Second Reading debates on Bills of this nature have not been really exhaustive in any way, in my opinion, and I think it would be better to let this Second Reading go through now. After all, this Bill only deals with certain specific things, and I do not think the Hospitals' Report touched this matter at all.
I should like to agree, Sir, with what Senator Dowdall has said. I think that this Bill will be the subject of very close examination and discussion later on, and if the Hospitals' Report impinges on it then the matter can be discussed much better in the way Senator Dowdall has suggested than here. I fancy that nobody here will be in a better position to discuss the Bill a week hence than to-day. I think it is a purely domestic Bill, a purely internal rearrangement in the interest of the better working of these hospitals and, therefore, it seems to me to be the sort of Bill that we should not delay.
I agree with the last speaker, and I should like to point out that it is the practice that, when a private Bill is being considered, the Departments concerned always send a detailed report to the committee in charge of the Bill and, therefore, I submit that there is no danger of not having a full consideration of the Bill.
I have read through this Bill and I discussed the matter some time ago, and I certainly am of opinion that it ought to go through its preliminary stages now and then be referred to the committee afterwards. I think there is really nothing in the Bill that could have any bad effect, or anything of that kind that could not be rectified in committee afterwards when it comes up. I think that nobody will object to the Bill as it stands. So far as I can make out, there is no objection to the principle of the Bill and, therefore, I think that there should be no delay.
I should like to point out to the Minister, Sir, that the practice is that, when a private Bill is not objected to in principle, nobody objects to giving it a Second Reading. The Minister says that he does not object to the Bill on principle, and I should like to point out to him that, unless there is something of a very objectionable character in a Bill, the practice has been that Senators do not vote against its being given a Second Reading. By doing so, however, they do not alienate their right to criticise the Bill afterwards, where necessary. In view of that practice, I think we should give this Bill a Second Reading, because it is purely in the nature of what might be described as a preliminary canter of the Bill.
I take it that the question is that the Bill be now read a Second Time.
Question put and agreed to.