MR. HERBERT ROBERTS (Denbighshire, W.)I beg to ask the Vice-President of the Committee of Council on Education (1) whether his attention has been drawn to the position of the Board school at Llansantffraid-Glyn-Ceiriog, Denbighshire; (2) whether he is aware the Report of the Department for 1897 stated that, unless care was taken to prevent the average attendance at the school 767 exceeding the recognised accommodation, the grant would be endangered; (3) whether the School Board repeatedly pressed for permission to enlarge the premises so as to provide the necessary accommodation; (4) whether he will state the ground upon which the Department declines to sanction the provision of additional accommodation; (5) whether he is aware that the great majority of the children of the locality are Nonconformists, and that there is no other unsectarian school within a distance of three miles; and (6) whether, in the interests of education in the district, he can state the conditions under which the difficulties in the way of sanctioning the increased accommodation referred to will be removed?
§ SIR J. GORSTThe answers to the first three and the fifth paragraphs are in the affirmative. There is, however, room in the Board school and the National school for all the children in the district, and the Department have, therefore, no power to sanction the enlargement of the Board school at present.