EDUCATION OF PAUPER CHILDREN BILL. (Hansard, 17 April 1855)

§ MR. EVELYN DENISON

said, he rose to move for leave to bring in a Bill to provide for the education of the children of poor persons in the receipt of out-door relief. His Bill was but a continuance of a system already in force, and might be considered as but supplementary to what had been already done. There were three Bills on the subject of education already before the House, but the noble Lord the Secretary for the Colonies and others had advised him to persevere. If the Bills at present before the House should receive their sanction, his Bill would be swallowed up and included in them. The object of his Bill was to enable the guardians of the poor to grant relief to the poor persons receiving relief out of the workhouses to enable them to provide education for their children, such education not being proposed to be made a condition of relief; the guardians not to compel attendance at any school to which the parents should object; the cost of this relief to be charged to the same accounts as other charges for the relief of paupers. He should have been glad to have introduced a clause charging a part of the expense to the Consolidated Fund, but the state of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's funds at the present time forbade him to think of any such proposal.