§ MR. FIELDTo ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether, seeing that the new scheme of examination for the Exchequer and Audit Department has boon framed after conference with headmasters representing various types of higher grade schools, he will state what headmasters, other than those of public schools, took part in this conference; and what schools other than public schools have been favoured with special centres for this examination.
(Answered by Mr. Runciman.) I am informed by the Civil Service Commissioners that, in the course of their deliberations leading up to the change in the scheme of examination for junior appointments in the Admiralty and the Ordnance Factories, second class assistant accountantships in the Army Accounts Department, and examinerships in the Exchequer and Audit Department, they consulted among other persons the headmasters of eighteen schools. A considerable number of these schools rank as grammar schools, but all are public schools in the sense that they are not conducted for private profit. Among them are four of the great London public day schools. The two secretaries of the Incorporated Association of Headmasters were consulted as conversant with the conditions of a large number of smaller public schools whose heads could not be individually asked for their views. Under the old conditions this examination was held together with the competitive examination for Sandhurst and Woolwich, and the schools which were centres for the Army examination were utilised for the convenience of candidates, not for the convenience of the schools. Under the new conditions this will not be possible, and it is not proposed at present to hold examinations elsewhere than in London, Edinburgh, and Dublin.