§ MR. RATHBONEasked the Vice President of the Committee of Council, Whether representations have been made to him from Masters in Public Elementary Schools as to the effect of sections 30 and 31 of the Code on their remuneration?
§ MR. W. E. FORSTERreplied, that representations had been made to the Education Department not only by masters of Liverpool through his hon. Friend, but from other parts of the country. The articles complained of referred to a notice that had been given that, after the 31st March, 1873, no day scholar above nine years of age should be examined according to Standard I., and to a similar notice with regard to March, 1874. These notices could have no legal effect until the Code had been again laid on the Table of the House, and until the House had an opportunity of considering them. There were the strongest possible educational grounds for making the alteration, and he trusted the Department would be supported in the matter. During the year the Department had obtained all the information they could with the view of seeing whether they should persist in the proposed alteration. He did not know of any reason for changing the conclusion at which they had arrived. The memorialists went very much on the ground that their salaries would be injuriously affected; but the Education Department, however much they desired that the teachers should be thoroughly remunerated, could not put the effect which the change might have upon the masters' salaries into competition with the general improvement in education which was likely to attend on the alteration. Masters had to deal not with the Government but with the managers, who obtained the means of paying them from three sources—the Government grant, the fees paid by the parents, and voluntary subscriptions; and it was quite plain that if the masters were too poorly paid their remedy lay with the managers. It was the interest of the masters to consider their position with regard to the managers the same as that of employés to employers.