HC Deb 27 March 1907 vol 171 c1814
MR. D. A. THOMAS

I beg to ask President of the Board of Education whether the decision at which he has arrived, namely, that where managers of non-provided schools have in the exercise of their duty engaged teachers on such terms as they think satisfactory and the education authority has hold aloof, the education authority has deprived itself of any solid ground of criticism, applies in cases where the managers have gone so far as to raise salaries in denominational schools to a level with those paid in provided schools in the same district; and to what extent this decision will interfere with the policy of discrimination between provided and non-provided schools adopted by the great majority of Welsh education authorities, and with their refusal to contribute from rates towards the maintenance of schools not under their full control.

MR. McKENNA

The statements in my hon. friend's Question are not my decision but mistaken inferences which he has drawn from a decision I gave in the Swansea case. I cannot express any opinion as to what conclusions may be drawn from an erroneous hypothesis.

MR. D. A. THOMAS

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the words I have used in the first part of the Question are those used by the Attorney-General?

MR. McKENNA

I am not aware of that.

†See (4) Debates, clxx., 1261–2.