[BILL 247.] COMMITTEE. (Hansard, 16 August 1881)

§ MR. T. P. O'CONNOR
said, the Bill was totally inadequate to the wants of the Irish people; but the Bishops had accepted it, and he supposed it must be accepted as an instalment of that justice which the people of Ireland had a right to expect.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, as it appeared to be the wish of the House, he trusted that they might be allowed to go into Committee on this Bill, which was simply for the purpose of carrying out the Act passed in 1879. He might add that the scheme, to which he could quite understand that some hon. Members objected to pledge themselves, would have to be submitted by the Senate for the approval of the Government.

§ MR. ARTHUR O'CONNOR
said, this Bill must not be supposed to contain the provisions which the people of Ireland looked upon as at all adequate to the situation. There was in Ireland a University system established by Government, which was entirely repugnant to the character and instincts of the people. That system had been protested against for now nearly a generation, and the Irish people would be glad if the Committee abolished it to-morrow. The late Government, he admitted, had done something in the matter of prizes, which, although it was not in accord with the wishes of Irish Catholics, was, at any rate, free from some of the objections which attended the old system in the Queen's Colleges. But the Queen's Colleges were retained, and to this day re- 156 ceived £21,000 a-year from the Consolidated Fund, as well as other sums voted annually by Parliament. There was, in fact, nearly £40,000 a-year expended for purposes which were repugnant to the wishes of the Irish people. The Government had now introduced an Examining Board, which they called a University, and it was about to be endowed with £20,000 a-year, or one-half of the amount expended upon the already condemned system. That was the principal reason why Irish Members and the great bulk of the people of Ireland were dissatisfied with the present scheme; they felt convinced that had the Conservative Government been allowed to carry out their intentions when they were in Office, they would have allowed a charge upon the Church Fund very much larger than the present Government had assented to. It was well known that the present Government was committed to a system of secular education, and that they viewed everything that was not purely of that character with mistrust and antagonism. They would, if they could, eliminate anything like religion from education. The Conservatives, however, were more in accord with the population of Ireland, so far as this matter was concerned; and the feeling was that, had the scheme been repugnant to the Irish people, it would have received at the hands of the Liberal Government a larger endowment. They were not allowed to propose an increase in the amount to be charged on the Church Fund, although the Senate of the University had proposed a scheme to carry out which it would have been necessary that a sum at least twice as large as that now proposed should be given to the University. The present Government had forced the Senate to curtail their programme, thereby diminishing the prizes and other advantages which the University would otherwise have been able to hold out to its alumni, and the people had, in consequence, an institution which would probably end in conspicuous failure, not because there were not ample materials for the establishment in Ireland of a flourishing University, but because what was necessary to its development was withheld by those who had the government of the country in their hands.