§ SIR CHARLES McLAREN (Leicestershire, Bosworth)To ask the Secretary to the Board of Education whether his attention has been called to the resolution of the Leicestershire Education Committee to exclude from the public elementary schools in the county from 1st January next all children under five years of age in rural districts and all children under five years of age in such urban districts as the general purposes committee may 863 deem to come within the category of unfitness on physical grounds to attend school under that age; and whether, until the new Education Code takes legal effect, it will authorise the payment to the Leicestershire Education Committee of grants for infants at 22s. a head (as in the case of older children) in place of the payment of 17s. per head, the present rate, in order to compensate the county to some extent for the financial loss involved by raising the school age from three to five years.
(Answered by Sir William Anson.) The Board have been informed of the resolution referred to in the Question. The Board have no power under the present code to pay grant for infants at 22s. instead of 17s., beyond the power given by Article 31a (ii) to do so in cases where the average attendance of the infant division does not exceed twenty. The hon. Baronet is under a misapprehension in supposing that the new Code will give any increased power in this direction. The Article will remain exactly as before.