SUPPLY—CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES. (Hansard, 17 April 1855)

§ MR. HADFIELD

said, he was dissatisfied that so large a sum should be left in the care and management, which were so generally complained of, of the governmental departments. He objected to the principle of Government interfering with education at all. Education Votes were no more than moral poison to prevent the healthy action of the public spirit of the country. The voluntary system had done an enormous amount of good in respect of education. It was not the voluntary system that had failed in the country; it was the compulsory system that had done the mischief. Since the repeal of the Test Act there had been shown an amount of energy in the education of the people among the partisans of the voluntary system such as had not been surpassed in any part of the world at any time. Pouring out upon education money derived from the taxes of the country was giving a premium for the discontinuance of that mighty energy which had been shown during the last few years. During the last twenty-three years there had been at work that mighty influence which had attained the result of giving instruction to one in every eight, a result which the highest authorities some time ago declared would be highly satisfactory if it could be attained. One in seven of the population of the country were also in the course of moral and religious instruction in Sunday and night schools, by 318,000 ladies and gentlemen, a result which never could have been got from Government. He begged to move that the Vote of 100,000l. be disallowed.