After the establishment of the Irish Free State in 1922, little was done to update the 1908 Act or to ensure that its rules were observed, particularly those on corporal punishment. The purpose of the Act was to humanise reformatory and industrial schools and orphanages, and to reduce physical punishment. The 1908 Act regulations remained in force in Ireland almost unchanged until the 1970s, while elsewhere in Europe more progressive regimes developed, mainly after 1945. In contrast, the 1941 Children's Act, drafted while Éamon de Valera was briefly Minister of the Department of Education, reduced the minimum age of inmates to below 6 years, allowing small children to be detained because of their parents' poverty.