§ MR. SAMUEL YOUNG (Cavan, E.)To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if he is aware that 1965 for some years the two chief inspectors of the Natioal Board of Education have been acting in an arbitrary manner towards many of the subordinate inspectors under their jurisdiction, and at the same time threatening them that, if they intended to have any Questions asked in Parliament as to their treatment, the Commissioners would visit those who so complained with the severest punishment within their power to inflict; and whether he will state when and in what manner the Commissioners authorised the chief inspectors to adopt intimidating methods of this kind towards subordinates for merely complaining of their treatment.
(Answered by Mr. Birrell) The Commissioners of National Education inform me that their chief inspectors have for many years been duly authorised to impress upon the inspectors generally that to endeavour to influence the action of the Board by procuring Questions in Parliament in reference to their personal or official concerns was contrary to the regulations of the public service and of the Commissioners. So long ago as 2nd May, 1867, a special Treasury Minute on the subject of private solicitation of Members of Parliament, was issued. Inspectors can always appeal to the Commissioners against arbitrary acts on the part of the chief inspectors, but no such appeals have been made nor, so far as the Commissioners are aware, have any such arbitrary acts taken place.