The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1911-03-11
CONDITION Of
IRISH SCHOOLS
John Dillon in the House of Com
mons Criticises the Support
of Irish Schools.
According to the Present Arrange
ment the Funds Decrease as
Pupils Increase.
England in a Much Better Condition
to do Without State Aid
Than Ireland.

In a speech in the House of Com
mons recently Mr.. John Dillon anal
yzed the Irish public school situation
in such way as to throw new light
on that subject. The speakers init
mate knowledge OF conditions gives
his words special weight. Following
is that portion OF the speech dealing
with the Irish school question:
The point on which desire to speak
very emphatically is the question Of
the whiskey money and the condition
Of education in Ireland. That question
affects education in this country in
very minor degree as compared with
Ireland. I regret exceedingly that the
secretary of the treasury has not been
able to give us the figures for Ire
land, and that we are still ignorant of
the proposals as interpreted into fig
ures which the government intends to
apply to intermediate education in
Ireland. So far as | can understand,
the proposal is that III lieu of the
whiskey money, which has proper
tionately steadily decreased for the
last ten years, and has almost disap-
peared entirely in the year just ended,
the government proposes to take a
standard year, and to give to Ireland
a fixed amount as a permanent grant,
not f1uctuating as it does at present,
this amount being the amount realized
by the whiskey duties in the year
190S-9 The last figure I have here
is G49,504-that was the amount in
the year ended March, 1908, and sup
pose the amount in the year 190S-9
would be approximately the same, per-
haps a little less. Now, what is the
condition of intermediate education in
Ireland? The whiskey money, which
was in my opinion from the beginning
a most unreasonable and unfair pro-
vision for intermediate education, was
set up in the year 1891, and in that
year the total amount was $4,000.
In the year 1900 it reached the high
water mark, and Irish intermediate
education got G71, 400 from the whis-
key money, and the total revenue for
intermediate education was G103,000,
the balance being made up by interest
on the sum of one million of the Irish
church surplus fund. Since that the
whiskey money has steadily declined.
1t went down from s71,000 to e64,-
600, $4,000, s50,00O, G4s,o0O, and
then 949,0O0, which I understand to
be the standard year.
Fall in Money-Rise in Pupils.
From G71,000 it fell to G49,000 a
fall of s22OOO year, and coincident
with that fall the number of pupils
who passed the examinations under
the intermediate system in Ireland in
creased from 5,332 to 6,972 or about
30 per cent. Owing to this fall in the
exchequer contributions before the
budget was introduced at all most
serious crisis had arisen in the con-
dition Of intermediate education in
Ireland. The number of pupils were
increasing year after year, and there
was a state of unrest, uncertainty and
discomfort in the intermediate schools
of Ireland. In the year in which the
budget was introduced the whiskey
money fell by e17,000, and now the
chancellor of the exchequer proposes
to take a standard and stereotype the
year 19OS-9 which would fix it rough
ly at about G50,000 a year-we have
not the exact figures-and that would
be a permanent grant, but it would be
100000 less than we had II years
ago. l say without hesitation that
that is an absolutely intolerable po-
sition. The statement Of figures does
not adequately convey the position,
and I am sure the chancellor of the
cxchequer, in the various facts that
must come to mis- notice, has never ap-
piled his mind to the facts of this par
ticular problem of intermediate edu-
cation in Ireland It really does not
convey the extent Of the grievance
from which we suffer in Ireland in this
respect intermediate education in
ireland has an income derived from
two sources mainly. The first is the