§ MR. J. P. FARRELLI beg to ask the-Secretary to the Treasury whether any 871 claim recently came before the Board of Works for a sum of £68 15s., balance of a sum of £103. 2s. 8d., the cost to the managers of building a national school at Ardagh, county Longford, over and above the estimate made in accordance with the plan of the Board of Works; whether he is aware that this plan was first devised and approved many years ago by the Board, and that, in consequence of the increase in price of labour and materials, the Board's estimate, which under this plan in 1887 was only £474, was in 1890 raised to £674, an increase in three years of nearly 50 per cent.; and whether, seeing that the Education Department passed all the managers' accounts, and that of the £103 2s. 8d. excess claimed, recommended an increase from £82 12s. to £110 2s. in respect of one item, and in view of the fact that these schools have been admitted by the Board's inspector to be admirably constructed, and that since 1890, when the last increase in estimates for work under the Board's plan was sanctioned, materials and labour have advanced at least 30 per cent., especially in remote districts in Ireland, and as the local contribution was fully and freely paid for these schools, the Board of Works will now give their assent to the further payment of a supplemental grant of £68 15s. being two-thirds of the sum in excess of the original estimate which the buildings cost.
§ MR. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAINGrants under the regulations of the National Education Commissioners are limited to two-thirds of the estimated cost of the work except in the case of school enclosures, and the managers of the schools in question have received the highest grant to which under these circumstances they are entitled. I ought to add that the original estimate for the school at Ardagh was £530, not £474, as stated in the question. It is possible that the scale of estimated cost embodied in the regulations above referred to may require to be revised in view of the rise of prices since it was originally fixed. This matter is now being investigated, but I do not think it would, in any case, be possible to make the alteration retrospective.