§ Mr. PATRICK O'BRIENasked the Chief Secretary whether his attention has been called to the cases of Michael O'Connell and his wife, Mary O'Connell, of Newpark, in Kilkenny rural district and Parliamentary borough, the former being a native of county Gahvay, and the latter of county Monaghan; whether he is aware that Michael O'Connell, having spent some twenty years in all, in three or four different periods, in the United States, and having on one occasion gone through some formalities which, as far as he recollects, involved his admission as citizen there, is now held ineligible for an old age pension as an alien, though qualified by residence under The Old Age Pensions Act, 1911, and that his wife is held to be also an alien by the fact of being married to him; whether he is aware that Michael O'Connell alleges that his status as an American citizen has been forfeited by him by more than five years' absence from the United States; whether any means of testing this will be availed of, there being no such means at claimant's disposal; whether he is aware that in other cases this technical alienage of British subjects who for all practical purposes have resumed their British citizenship causes individual hardship under the Old Age Pensions Act; and whether he will endeavour to obviate such hardship in the case of native-born subjects who have spent the greater part of their working years in the United Kingdom and have substantially resumed their British citizenship, either by instructions to pension officers to construe nationality in a substantial and not a purely technical sense in such cases or by issuing renaturalisation papers at fees within such persons' power to pay, with retrospective operation?
§ Mr. BIRRELLThis case does not appear to have come before the Local Government Board, and they have therefore no power to take any action in the matter.
§ Mr. HACKETTasked the grounds upon which William Corbett, Knockahornaduff, Drombane, Thurles, has been refused an old age pension by the Local Government Board; and whether he produced a certificate which showed his younger brother John Corbett was over seventy-three years?
§ Mr. BIRRELLThis case does not appear to have come before the Local2216W Government Board, and the required information cannot therefore be given.
§ Mr. HACKETTasked the reasons the Local Government Board refused an old age pension to Mrs. John Carroll, Bishops-wood, Dundrum; whether herself and her husband reside on a farm of three acres; and whether Mrs. Carroll produced a baptismal certificate that she was over seventy years?
§ Mr. BIRRELLMrs. Carroll's claim was disallowed by the Local Government Board on the ground that her means exceeded the statutory limit. In addition to having a well-stocked holding of five acres, her husband earns about £45 a year working on the county roads. The question of her age did not arise.