§ Mr. CRUMLEYasked how many creamery experts or instructors are 2045 usually engaged by the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction for Ireland in compiling and issuing specifications for dairy machinery for the use of creameries in Ireland; what are the special qualifications of such experts to enable them to advise as to the best types of machines suitable for dairy requirements in order to assist Irish creameries to compete with Continental and Colonial rivals; how many of those experts are qualified engineers, civil or mechanical, respectively; will the Department accept full legal responsibility for the advice tendered by their experts; and are the specifications always submitted to qualified engineers before being issued?
The VICE-PRESIDENT of the DEPARTMENT of AGRICULTURE (Ireland, Mr. T. W. Russell)The Department's district instructors in dairying—eight in number—fill in the necessary particulars in the form of specification supplied to them in skeleton by the Department. These specifications are then examined and issued on the advice of one expert who is usually engaged on this work at the central offices. This expert's qualification is that he has nineteen years' experience of Continental and Colonial dairy machinery. He is not a qualified engineer, but it should be remembered that the fact of a person being a civil or mechanical engineer does not necessarily render him qualified in regard to dairy machinery. The Department do not accept legal responsibility for advice which it is competent for creamery societies to disregard. The answer to the concluding query is in the negative.