§ MR. T. M. HEALY (Louth, N.)To ask the Chief Secretary to the. Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether he has received the Resolution of the Dundalk Rural District Council respecting the action of the County Court Judge in dealing with labourers schemes in County Louth; if he will inquire into the allegation that on the hearing of the Ardee petitions the County Court Judge stated that it was a scandal to put a labourers' cottage on any man's land against his will; whether, at the subsequent hearing of petitions against the Dundalk scheme, the County Court Judge, out of eighty-eight contested cases, rejected eighty cottages; whether the district council allege that in many instances this was done without their witnesses being heard, the judge being of the opinion that an appeal lay from his decision, and that in other cases he refused 2248 to act on the definition of agricultural labourer in the Labourers Act; and whether he proposes to take any action in the matter.
(Answered by Mr. Birrell.) I have received the Resolution referred to, but I have no means of knowing whether the County Court Judge expressed the opinion attributed to him. The grounds of the orders made by County Courts on appeals under the Labourers Acts are not communicated to the Local Government Board. Those orders are final, and I have no control over the County Court Judge, and no power to interfere with his judicial action.