§ MR. HEALYasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Whether it is the fact that Dr. Allen, of Midleton, has been appointed medical attendant to the Ballycotton police station; whether Ballycotton is twelve miles from Midleton, and entirely outside the Midleton Dispensary district; whether there is no regular means of communication either by train, car, or telegraph between the two places; whether it is one of the regulations of the police force that the post of medical attendant shall, if possible, be held by the dispensary doctor of the district, insomuch that a dispensary doctor holding such a post, if he should resign the dispensary, must also give up his Constabulary charge; whether the regulation also provide district, Dr. Riordan being a Catholic; whether it is the that a doctor other than the dispensary doctor is only to be appointed in the event of the dispensary doctor not wishing to have medical charge of the Constabulary, and in such a case directs that the residence of the doctor appointed shall be as central as possible in the district; whether Dr. Riordan, in whose dispensary district Ballycotton is, and who resides at Cloyne, in the centre of his district, was also a candidate for the post to which Dr. Allen was appointed, communication from Ballycotton to Midleton being actually through Cloyne, which is also the nearest telegraph office to Ballycotton; whether it is the fact that the appointment in question was formerly held by Dr. Dwane, Dr. Riordan's predecessor in the dispensary appointment, and that on his death Dr. Riordan's application for the post of Constabulary Medical Attendant was, in defiance of the regulation referred to, refused for purely political reasons, the gentleman appointed being a Protestant, resident however in the district; whether, on the resignation of the latter, Dr. Riordan has now been similarly treated, the appointment being now given to a Protestant doctor resident 1359 outside the district, Dr. Riordan being a Catholic; whether it is the case that Dr. Riordan's qualifications are of the highest kind, he having been elected to the position of Dispensary Doctor at Cloyne by the unanimous votes of the guardians, Conservative as well as National, and having been previously medical officer in the Killeagh Dispensary District, where he also held the appointment of Medical Attendant to the Constabulary; and, whether the police themselves have made numerous complaints as to the non-appointment of Dr. Riordan, he having during the previous appointment been frequently attending them and their families, though not their appointed physician?
MR. TBEVELYAN,in reply, said, that the statement in question, with regard to the relative positions of the places mentioned, was fairly accurate. It was true that Dr. Riordan twice applied for the position referred to; but it was not correct that his non-appointment was in any way attributable to a question of religion. Dr. Allen was selected because, in the opinion of the Inspector General, he was the most eligible candidate. As regarded the regulation as to the appointment of dispensary doctors, that regulation had been withdrawn, because it was found not to work satisfactorily.