§ SIR JOHN GORSTI beg to ask the Secretary to the Board of Education, whether he will give the names of the Departmental Committee which the President of the Board of Education has appointed for the purpose of providing useful and precise information on the physical condition of children in public elementary schools and the date of their 457 appointment; what methods the Committee have adopted for obtaining information more precise than that furnished to the Committee on Physical Deterioration by Dr. Eichholz and other witnesses; and to what use the information thus provided has been put.
§ SIR WILLIAM ANSONAn Inter-Departmental Committee, consisting of Mr. H. W. Simpkinson, C.B., Assistant Secretary of the Board of Education, Chairman; Mr. H. Franklin Parsons, M.D., Assistant Medical Officer under the Local Government Board; Mr. C. Jackson, Chief Inspector of Elementary Schools under the Board of Education; The Hon. Maude Lawrence, Chief Woman Inspector of the Board of Education; Mr. R. Walrond, Senior Examiner of the Board of Education; with Mr. E. H. Pelham, Junior Examiner of the Board of Education, as Secretary, was appointed on March 9th to collect certain information as to the medical inspection of children in elementary schools, and as to the provision of meals for such children by voluntary agencies. I am sending the right hon. Member the terms of reference. I am not prepared to state the methods which the Committee will employ for obtaining this information. But I hope that they will provide information more thorough and precise than any which we at present possess; and will enable deductions to be drawn less indefinite in character than those which are supplied in the Report of the Physical Deterioration Committee.
§ DR. MACNAMARAMay I ask whether this is a Departmental Committee appointed to consider or to revise the findings of another Departmental Committee?
§ SIR WILLIAM ANSONNo, Sir. It was appointed to collect facts which may be very useful.