§ MR. SEXTONasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, What is now the position of the question as to the defalcations of Mr. T. D. Elliott, collector to the Blackrock township, and his further employment under the Local Government Board; whether he has observed that, at a recent meeting of the Township Board, a commissioner declared that "the ratepayers were up in arms against them," and the Board rejected a motion for a public inquiry by an official commission, and also, by the casting vote of the chairman, a motion for a sworn investigation by the Local Government Board; how many members of the present Board have been co-opted, and how many elected; whether a former collector of the township died, leaving an extensive deficit, and how was it made good; whether one secretary of the township absconded, to escape the punishment of fraud; and another falsified his accounts, and was allowed to go unpunished; whether, with regard to Mr. Elliott, the commissioners never required him to provide any guarantee; whether they allowed him to print his official receipt books, and never subjected his accounts to any regular or efficient check; and, whether, against his defalcations of £2,600, they have credited him with £200 in respect of a house, already mortgaged to the full extent of its value, and also with a large sum for poundage of moneys collected, 1462 but appropriated by the collector, and never paid into the township fund; and, whether any step is proposed by the Government to protect the ratepayers of Blackrock?
§ MR. TREVELYANThis Question refers to a variety of matters which are not within the knowledge or responsibility of the Government or the Local Government Board. However, I referred it to the Secretary of the Black-rock Township Commission, who informs that it will be laid before the Commissioners at their meeting to-morrow—the Committee to whom the matters of Mr. Elliott's accounts have been referred, not feeling it to be within the scope of their authority to deal with it. In the meantime, however, the Committee say that the inference fairly deducible from the Parliamentary Questions makes it evident that clearly the interrogator has been grossly misinformed as to the "facts in every important particular." I quote these words from the Secretary's letter. I shall be at Dublin in the course of the Whitsuntide Holidays, and shall satisfy myself how the matter stands.