text: He was appointed to the new Air Council at Westminster in 1919 by the postwar coalition government.  Promoted to Under-Secretary of State for Air in 1920, Londonderry was nevertheless frustrated and took advantage of his Ulster connections to join the first Cabinet of the Government of Northern Ireland in June 1921, as Leader of the Senate and Minister for Education. Londonderry was particularly interested in education and favoured a secularised interest, not the least as a way to end Catholic education. Londonderry appointed the Lynn Commission, headed by Robert Lynn, for advice about education. Lynn stated during the commission's hearings his belief that it would be a waste of public funds to teach Gaelic in the schools, a proposal that was widely seen as promoting Unionism, and led to a Catholic boycott of the commission.
  In 1923 his Education Act sought to advance the prospect of mixed  Protestant-Catholic education by permitting religious instruction only after school hours and with parental consent. Both Protestant or Catholic educational interests objected and the measure was amended in 1925 to the point that its purpose, to secularise schooling in Northern Ireland, was lost.
  In 1926, Londonderry resigned from the Government of Northern Ireland and, in 1929, he left the Parliament of Northern Ireland entirely.