§ MR. MAXWELL (Dumfriesshire)I beg to ask the Secretary for Scotland if the Education Department have sanctioned the building of a new school in Cummertrees parish, and if the Department have withdrawn their approval of the addition to the present school, a plan of which the School Board in the first instance submitted to them; and whether, in this and in similar cases where His Majesty's Inspectors of Schools re quire additional accommodation, involving large capital expenditure, to be provided, the Department will not withold their approval of such expenditure until the new education authorities are constituted under the Education Bill now before the House.
*MR. A. GRAHAM MURRAYIt is not the case that the Department withdrew approval of the addition to the school at first proposed. The School Board at their own instance proposed a new school in place of this addition. The Department cannot undertake to withhold approval of such expenditure pending the constitution of new authorities where, as in the present instance, 1076 further school accommodation is urgently required.