SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACEasked the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education, Whether he is aware that the Endowed School Commissioners have, in a Communication addressed by them to one of the Trustees of the Endowed School a Mitcheldean, in the county of Gloucester made the following statement:—
The general principle on which Educations Endowments are dealt with by the Commissioner is that they should not be devoted to purely, Elementary Education, which is now fully provided for by law;and whether, acting in pursuance of that statement, it is the intention of the Commissioners generally to devote to education of a higher grade funds which have been distinctly left for the purpose of primary or elementary education?
§ MR. W. E. FORSTER, in reply, said that the hon. Baronet would see from the Endowed Schools Act of 1869 that no power was given to the Commissioners to devote any sum to any particular purpose, and that the duty of the Commissioners was to prepare schemes to be submitted to the Education Department, and, if approved, to be submitted to the House before taking legal effect. Under these circumstances, it would hardly become the House to interfere with the mode in which the Commissioners prepared the schemes, the Government being responsible for the shape which those recommendations eventually assumed. He could not therefore, give a distinct answer to the Question; but he had been requested by the Commissioners to state that they were extremely anxious that everyone concerned in this movement should be fully apprised of them, and it was only fair to point out that the quotation made by the hon. Baronet presented a different appearance when read with its context.