HC Deb 31 July 1913 vol 56 cc706-7
17. Mr. SHEEHAN

asked the Chief Secretary whether he has received a resolution from the Cork District Committee of the Irish Land and Labour Association, pointing to the necessity of immediately providing the further loan to finance outstanding improvement schemes under the Labourers (Ireland) Acts; whether, as stated in this resolution, some of these schemes have been hung up for the last four years for want of money and thousands of families have been, as a consequence, obliged to live in unsanitary dwellings as well as deprived of the product of the acre allotments which would have helped them to maintain a more tolerable existence; and whether, in view of the hardship which the further postponement of this matter will entail upon the most necessitous of the Irish rural population, he will reconsider the advisability of introducing a non-contentious Labourers Bill before the close of this Session to provide the Grant of the additional million, stipulated for in the Land Purchase Bill, right away?

Mr. BIRRELL

I have received several resolutions of the nature indicated in the question including one from the Cork District Committee of the Irish Land and Labour Association. As I have already informed the hon. Member, it would be impossible at this stage of the Session to effect any legislation on the subject by means of a separate Bill.

Mr. T. M. HEALY

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in the case of Uganda and other loans it was clone by Estimate and afterwards legalised in the Appropriation Bill?

Mr. BIRRELL

I am aware of that precedent.

19. Mr. CRUMLEY

asked whether all the labourers' cottages contracted for by the Enniskillen, county Fermanagh, Rural District Council in the year 1910 have yet been finished; and, if so, will the Local Government Board now authorise the district council to proceed with their second scheme as approved by the Board's inspector?

Mr. BIRRELL

Of the seventy-one cottages in the council's scheme, thirty-seven have been completed, while the remaining thirty-four, although contracted for, are still unfinished. No "second scheme" has been received by the Local Government Board from this rural district council.

Mr. CRUMLEY

Will the Board not take steps to have these cottages, now three years in hand, finished?

Mr. BIRRELL

We have to work through the Rural District Council. I will call their attention to it.