§ MR. JORDAN (Clare, W.)I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that the Commissioners of National Education in Ireland have, for 260 the past four or five years, paid a grant to Townavanny National School, in County Fermanagh, the average attendance being under 20 pupils, the manager being the Rev. John Donaldson, Presbyterian minister, the teacher being also a Presbyterian, the pupils attending the school being all Episcopalian; whether he is also aware that the local Episcopalian minister, the Rev. D. E. Dickson, is manager of a vested National School at Rossharbour, with an Episcopalian teacher, and within about a mile distant from the residences of the pupils attending the Townavanny school; and whether the Regulations of the Treasury sanction the payment of a grant to this Presbyterian school, for the purpose of giving religious instruction to a small number of Episcopalian children, when they can, as in this case, obtain such instruction from a teacher of their own creed in the school about a mile from their homes, there being no Presbyterian children whatever in the locality of either school?
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURI have not received a detailed Report on the several points mentioned in the question; but the Commissioners of National Education inform me that it is the case that the first mentioned school receives a modified and reduced grant. The second mentioned school receives a full class grant, the attendance being sufficient. The Commissioners propose to inquire further into this matter.