CONSIDERATION. (Hansard, 1 May 1877)

§ SIR HENRY WILMOT
moved, as an Amendment, that the Bill should be recommitted to the former Committee, in respect of Clauses 42 to 46, inclusive, and Clause 52. The borough had been extended so as to include, among other districts, one called Litchurch, which had sufficient voluntary school accommodation, and the object of the proposed re-committal of the Bill was to keep Litchurch separate from Derby for educational purposes, so as to avoid placing the district under the Derby School Board.

MR. BALFOUR,
as one of the Committee, said, that in incorporating Lit-church with Derby for educational purposes, the Committee acted on the 145 recommendation of the Education Department, believing that it was hardly within their province to discuss it. He hoped Parliament would lay down a rule to guide Committees, and would say either that a State Department should not make such a recommendation, or that a Committee ought to accept such a recommendation when made; or that it should have an opportunity of examining the officers of the Department on the subject, so that it might know the grounds on which the recommendation was made. In this case he hoped the Bill would be sent back to the Committee, because the recommendations of a Department ought not to be of such a character that a Committee should accept them without consideration.

§ MR. HIBBERT
said, that at the time the Bill was before the Committee there was a deficiency in the school accommodation of Litchurch. He opposed the further reference to the Committee, on the ground that the object of it was to create one of those anomalies in local administration which Parliament was so anxious to get rid of, and the creating of which in Stafford and Cardiff was working so disadvantageously in those places that the hon. and learned Member for Chatham (Mr. Gorst) had introduced a Bill to get rid of the difficulties in those and similar cases. He contended that the definition of "borough" in the Education Act of 1870 would include the places to be incorporated with Derby by this Bill.

§ MR. RAIKES
admitted the undesirability of perpetuating anomalies, but urged that uniform principles should be adopted in all similar cases, and that a district affected should have the opportunity of being heard on a proposal to which it was opposed, particularly as, in spite of the definition of "borough" in the Act of 1870, the 11th clause of the Act of 1873 secured for such district the privilege now claimed for Litchurch. In an unopposed Bill which came before him from Newport, Isle of Wight, and where he had extended the school district, he took care that the Preamble should recite the consent of the parties. The Walsall Act was also based on the consent of the parties. The Nottingham Bill had extended the school district of the borough; but he had been assured that in that case also the consent of all 146 the adjoining districts had been obtained. He had hoped that the question had, indeed, been laid at rest as far as the Committees of that House were concerned, and that the line of action of Parliament where school districts had been enlarged had been in the direction he had indicated. The question was whether, by a private Act, they should deprive these districts of an immunity which they possessed by the law of the land. It was also a question of the administration of the Business of the House by its Committees. It would be unwise to regard this matter exclusively from the school-board point of view, because it involved the principle whether people should be taxed for purposes not their own, and against which Parliament by a general Act had insured their immunity.

§ VISCOUNT SANDON
said, the question before the House was of a technical character, and it was for the House to decide whether the Committee had acted within the proper bounds in the matter. He was always sorry to find himself acting in opposition to the opinion of the hon. Member for Chester (Mr. Raikes) in a matter of this kind; but it was the deliberate intention of Parliament that the Education Department should make known its views. The Standing Orders of this year had been altered, as he believed, for this very purpose; and if hon. Members would refer to them, they would find that any private Bill affecting educational matters was obliged to be deposited at the Education Department, and that if the Committee which sat upon it did not adopt the views of the Department, they were bound to report their reasons for dissenting. Without going into the merits of the case for making boroughs in all instances conterminous with a school district, in favour of which he considered the arguments overwhelming, he might state that the Education Department had given the subject, as a mere question of law, their most serious consideration, and they felt it to be their duty to protest against any addition being made to the boundaries of the borough, unless a corresponding addition were also made to the school-board area of the borough, By the Act of 1870 Parliament acknowledged only three school districts—the metropolis, the municipal boroughs, and the civil parish—provided it was not in- 147 cluded in the boundaries of the municipal borough. Parliament had ruled that the municipal borough was to be the borough for the school district under all circumstances. The Department was therefore bound to assert the municipal borough, when it was formed, to be the school district of the place. It had no official knowledge whatever of the Resolutions, by these Standing Orders of the Chairmen of Private Bill Committees, and was bound to carry out the provisions of the Education Act. He would abstain from voting, as the question might be held to reflect somewhat upon his action in the matter; and it was therefore obviously more suitable that he should leave the House perfectly free to pass its own judgment upon it.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
quite agreed with the noble Lord, and hoped the House would not decide the question from any feeling connected with the position of Private Bill Committees. The question at stake was whether, if they enlarged a borough, they should put the new district in an awkward and difficult position by making such a distinction? He could perfectly well understand that the dislike of a new district which was intended to be annexed to a borough to a school board ought to be heard by the Committee as a reason why it should not be annexed; but he hoped that the House would not acknowledge the principle that when once annexed there were to be two different administrations for education.

§ MR. BEACH
assured the House that the decision arrived at by the Chairmen of the Private Bill Committees at the conference to which reference was made had been come to after much consideration.

§ SIR CHARLES FORSTER
defended the course taken by the Select Committee to which the Bill had been referred.

§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER
said, the House had to consider a question of some difficulty relating to the action of Committees on Private Bills. His hon. Friend the Chairman of Ways and Means said that in these cases a certain law existed; Bills were brought forward which might or might not alter the application of that law in the particular cases, and it was not desirable that the decision of a question which was one of considerable general 148 importance should be left to the varying decisions of Private Bill Committees. The Education Act of 1870 had provided that a borough should be a school district, and there could be no doubt that the boroughs then existing were made school districts. But it was contended that the operation of the Act was prospective. A great many districts had been added since the Act was passed without being made portions of school districts. He did not wish them to enter on that point, but it was one that ought to be discussed and settled. His hon. and learned Friend the Member for Chatham (Mr. Gorst) had in charge a Bill which would settle the question or, at any rate, raise a discussion upon it; and, under the circumstances, he should give his vote in favour of the suggestion which his hon. Friend the Member for Chester (Mr. Raikes) had made.