Report on Northern Irish education system regrets absence of Catholic input

Belfast, 26 August 1922 – An interim report on the future of the Northern Irish education system has been prepared by the Unionist MP, Robert Lynn. The report was commissioned by the Minister for Education, the Marquess of Londonderry, Charles Vane-Tempest-Stewart, and is 104 pages long.

The department committee under Mr Lynn is unanimous in its recommendations, which included the provision of an Advisory Council to make representations to the minister, or to be available for consultation. It also recommends that county boroughs, urban districts, and rural districts be units of local administration and that combined literary and moral but separate religious instruction be given in schools. The function of local committees will be to ensure that adequate provision is made for the primary education of children in its area, with future state aid taking the form of long-term loans rather than grants.

Another recommendation is that the Minister for Education should be given power to amalgamate primary schools where necessary with regard being given to the needs of both Roman Catholic and Protestant communities.

The committee was established under the chairmanship of Mr Lynn in September 1921 and met on 24 occasions, with a further 49 meetings of sub-committees being held.

Critically, the report was prepared in the absence of input from the Catholic-Nationalist minority in the six counties.

‘It is greatly to be regretted’, the report notes, ‘that on this committee, reflecting as it does almost every other shade of opinion in the six counties, Roman Catholic interests have not been directly represented.’

‘We understand, however, that the responsibility for this circumstance rests entirely with the Roman Catholics themselves, as invitations to serve on the committee were issued to representatives of the Roman Catholic Church, and were in every case refused.’

The report adds that Roman Catholic institutions and organisations also refused to give evidence to the committee. ‘We hope that, notwithstanding the disadvantage at which we were placed by this action, it will be found that Roman Catholic interests have not suffered.’

[Editor's note: This is an article from Century Ireland, a fortnightly online newspaper, written from the perspective of a journalist 100 years ago, based on news reports of the time.]