Letter to the Provisional Government of Southern Ireland

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xesponsible with the Provisional Government for the performance
of the January agreement. They would, therefore, welcome an early
official assurance that payment has actually been made in all cases
that have matured for payment and will be made in outstanding
cases as these are determined or agreed. They would also be glad of
a like assurance as to the progress of the work of local investigation.


3. It was also agreed in January last that claims in respect of
malicious injuries, whether to persons or property, sustained after
July 11th, 1921, should be dealt with in the usual way by the County
Courts and discharged by the local authorities. That decision was
reached in the hope that a resumption of normal civil life in Ireland
would allow such claims to be readily presented by the individual,
heard in the course of ordinary business by the Court, and paid by the
local authorities within whose areas the injuries had been committed.
In practice this resumption of peaceful life has been delayed by persons
acting in defiance of the Provisional Government, whose challenge to
its authority has recently, after long forbearance, been met by force
of arms. From this delay have followed two consequences vitally
affecting the arrangement made in January for the compensation of
persons who have sustained injuries since the Truce of July 11th of
last year.


4. The most striking of these consequences has lain in the whole¬
sale destruction of Irish property, the numerous injuries to Irish citizens
which have been inflicted during the fighting which began a month
ago and is in progress at the date of this despatch. His Majesty's
Government observe that an official notice was published in the
Dublin Gazette of July 11th, inviting those, who have sustained loss to
their property on or since Jime 27th in the course of the military opera¬
tions of the National Army, to lodge with the Provisional Government
particulars of their claims. They infer from this notice that the Pro¬
visional Government have been moved to contemplate the settlement
of this large body of claims on a national rather than on a local basis.
Wliile, however, the responsibility for meeting these claims to com¬
pensation must rest upon the Irish Government, His Majesty's Govern¬
ment cannot divest themselves of a duty to see that such claims are
met equitably and as promptly as inevitable difficulties allow. They
would, therefore, be glad if the Provisional Government would inform
them fully and authoritatively of the measures which they are adopting
to meet these exceptional claims in respect of injuries whether to person
or property.


5. A second consequence of the delay in the return to normal
conditions in Southern Ireland has also engaged the anxious considera¬
tion of His Majesty's Government. A number of cases have come to
their notice of persons who have suffered malicious injury to person
and property since July 11th of last year, but who have been deterred
or prevented by the very causes which led up to the recent fighting
from prosecuting their la'^ul claims in the normal way. In some such
â– cases, though notices have been lodged, the Courts have been unabl