§ MR. DILLON (Mayo, E.)I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, in the case of the highest grade of national school teachers, known as first of first-class, who, during the three years ending 31st March, 1900, had charge of small schools with an average attendance not sufficient to warrant their full class salary for the whole period, whether he will state on what basis their consolidated incomes were calculated, and to what extent were their vested rights to a higher salary safeguarded when subsequently appointed as principals to schools with an average of sixty, considering that under these circumstances they would according to the old rules, get full class salary and about double their former capitation and results fees; and will he also state how the income of a first of first class teacher is determined if he leaves a school with an average attendance of sixty and takes charge of one with an average of less than thirty-five.
§ MR. ATKINSON (for Mr. WYNDHAM)The consolidated incomes of all teachers were fixed in accordance with Rule 36 (a) of the new Rules and Regulations which were laid on the Table of the House last session. (Command Paper 447 No. 601.) First of first-class teachers joined the new grades under Rule 37 (e). If such a teacher changed from a small school in which the average did not warrant his class salary to a large one in which the average would have warranted it, had the old rules remained in force, the case was specially considered by the Commissioners, and if the equity of the case was not, in their opinion, met by the general rules, they granted such a teacher what was estimated to be his "normal" income in the new school, or they granted an increase in his consolidated income equal to the difference of the rate of class salary which he was paid in his old school and that to which he might have been entitled in his new school. If a first or first-class teacher leaves a school with an average of sixty and goes to a school with an average less than thirty, but not less than twenty, he will be paid second-grade income only, and if the attendance at such school is less than twenty he will be paid third-grade income only.