MR. HUNTER CRAIG (Lanarkshire, Govan)I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if the attention of the Irish Local Government Board has been called to the recent proceedings before the Coleraine Rural District Council in the Coleraine district, where an occupant of a labourer's cottage was charged before the Council with permitting his daughters to take in sewing, and was induced, under threat of eviction, to promise that this should be discontinued, and that his daughters should work in the fields; and that the Council have adopted a form of agreement for the letting of labourers' cottages, binding the family of the labourer to work at agricultural work when required; and will he say if the Local Government Board has sanctioned the form of such agreements; and, if not, will he take 917 steps to prevent such conditions being introduced in the future.
§ THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. WYNDHAM,) DoverMy hon. friend has been misinformed in respect to the facts. A man named Leighton applied to the Council for a cottage. One or two councillors observed that he was not an agricultural labourer, and that his daughters were shirtmakers. He satisfied the Council that he and his family had always worked for farmers, and was accepted as a tenant of a cottage. He has not been threatened with eviction. The form of agreement made with tenants of cottages does not bind the family in the manner suggested.