§ Mr. SHEEHANasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether his attention has been called to the fact that considerable confusion has arisen in the administration of the Labourers (Ireland) Acts owing to the varying interpretation which inspectors under these Acts have placed upon the definition of an agricultural labourer as including any person working for hire in a rural district whose average wages in the year do not exceed 2s. 6d. a day; whether some inspectors have held this to mean 2s. 6d. a day for six days of the week, whilst others have interpreted it as embracing the seven days of the week; whether he is aware that the Attorney-General of that time, when the Irish Land Act of 1903, containing this clause, was passing through Parliament, explicitly declared that the expression 2s. 6d. a day was to apply as for the seven days of the week; and, owing to the limited and unsatisfactory nature of the existing definition, to the misinterpretation to which it is liable, and to the fact that it bars out a large class of deserving rural workers from the benefits of the Labourers Act, will he introduce into his present Land Bill a more satisfactory definition, and one which will bring the advantages of these Acts within the reach of every bonâ fide wage-earner in the country?
§ Mr. BIRRELLThe Local Government Board are not aware that any confusion has arisen on the point mentioned, or that their inspectors have given different interpretation of section 93 of the Irish Land Act of 1903, in so far as it relates to the limit of wages of the additional class of labourers brought within the Labourers Acts by the section. The section makes no reference whatever to "a week of six days" or to "a week of seven days," the words being "whose average wages in the year preceding the lodgment of the representation affecting him do not exceed 2s. 6d. a day." The Attorney-General of that time does not appear to have made the declaration alleged in the question. What he did promise, and what was subsequently embodied in the Land Bill, was to introduce words in the definition clause as originally drafted, making it clear that it was the average daily wage in the year that was meant. In the circumstances no amendment on the ground stated in the question appears to be necessary.