§ MR. KEIR HARDIE (West Ham, S.)I beg to ask the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education whether his attention has been called to a report on proceedings of the Glossop Town Council, in which it was resolved to publish a list of the names of those parents who had memorialised the Education Department in favour of having free education provided for their children, the object being, according to the report, to prevent other parents presenting similar Memorials in future; and what action the Education Department proposes taking to put an end to such proceedings?
§ THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (Mr. ACLAND, York, W.R., Rotherham)My attention has been called to a newspaper report of a meeting of the Glossop Town Council or a committee of the Council, when a Petition from the parents of about 200 children for free education which had been referred to the School Attendance Committee by the Education Department was discussed. According to this report, a motion to publish the names of the parents in question was moved in the following words:—
I think it would be better, and to prevent anything of this in the future, if we ask the Press to publish the names of the petitioners. I move that the memorialists' names be published in the public Press.The motion was carried, and the names published accordingly. I have received a protest against this method of proceeding from several parents. The Department does not in any way discourage reasonable publicity in inquiries so as to ascertain that Petitions are bonâ fide. But if attempts are made directly or indirectly to discourage parents from assorting their just rights to free education for their children under the Act of 1891 such a course can only load ultimately to an alteration of the law so as to give fuller facilities to parents on this subject.