§ MR. ERNEST GRAY (West Ham, N.)I beg to ask the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education whether he is aware that two classes, the one at Wolverhampton Free Library and the other one at the Willenhall Technical School, were taught last session by the same teacher, who gave to the students similar lessons for practically the same number of hours; that the Science and Art Department awarded a grant on behalf of the students attending the class in elementary physiology at Wolverhampton at the rate of 6d. per attendance, and at Willenhall at the rate of 2d. per attendance, though the inspector did not visit either of the classes during the whole of the session; and that the Science and Art Department have stated, in response to a protest by the manager of the Willenhall School, that previous knowledge of the school enabled the inspector to report as to its general efficiency, although such knowledge must necessarily have been founded on a different 1508 set of students; and whether, having regard to the regulation in Paragraph 40 of the Science and Art Directory to the effect that the grant shall depend upon the efficiency, as determined by the Department upon the inspector's report, and upon the success of the class in that subject at the annual examinations, he will give instructions for the report and the grant to the Willenhall School to be revised, and will take steps to prevent the Science and Art Department assessing grants for the current year's work upon their knowledge of schools during some previous year, when totally different conditions may have prevailed?
§ THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL ON EDUCATION (Sir J. E. GORST, Cambridge University)As the inspector was not able to visit these classes last year the attendance grant was fixed on the general result of their examination in May, as well as on his knowledge of them from previous years. In consequence, however, of a representation made by the managers of the Willenhall class as to what they had done in the way of providing apparatus, etc., the grant had, before the hon. Member put down his Question, been already revised and raised from 2d. to 3d. per attendance. The class, which would at the former rate have obtained 10s. less, has now received £1 5s. more than it would have received under the old system of payments on results. The Wolverhampton class, though its grant was at the maximum rate of 6d. an attendance, received less than it would have received on results, which were three times as good as those at Willenhall. All schools will, as far as possible, be inspected every year; but I cannot, until the staff of inspectors is increased, undertake that there shall be no exceptions.