§ [THIRD READING.]
§ Order for Third Reading read.
§ *MR. CLOUGH (Yorkshire, W.R., Skipton)said he did not desire to detain the House at any length, and he would, therefore, compress his complaint against the Bill into a few words. The key of the puzzle was to be found in two words in the first line of the schedule, viz., East Hardwick. Now East Hardwick was a school within the jurisdiction of the West Riding. The existing school was condemned by the Board of Education inspectors as far back as 1901. It was taken over by the local education authority on the appointed day, 1st April, 1904. In 1905 the local education committee formulated its requirements with regard to the school building, and after many negotiations the managers replied in November, 1906, that they had no funds out of which the school could be repaired. Thereupon the local education authority decided to provide a school themselves. That was in December, 1906 The Board of Education sent down their 1318 decision that a new school should be provided by the local education authority in May, 1907, and that decision had not yet been rescinded. He (Mr. Clough) asked a Question of the President of the Board of Education in July this year, and he said it had not been rescinded up to the 14th of that month. The Board urged the local authority to provide the school with all despatch. The local authority endeavoured to secure a site, but all the local owners of suitable and eligible sites refused to sell to the local education authority, who appealed for compulsory powers. The Board made a provisional order, which was incorporated in the Bill now down for Third Reading. It was introduced in the House of Lords on 5th May. The Second Reading came on on 1st June in the House of Lords, when Viscount Halifax moved that it be an Instruction to the Committee to omit this particular order and schedule with regard to the West Riding. The debate was adjourned till 24th June, when Lord Crewe, on behalf of the Government, undertook to withdraw the order on the Committee stage. On that understanding the Bill was read a second time. It passed through Committee, was reported, read a third time, and sent to the Commons on 21st July, minus the order regarding the West Riding. He (Mr. Clough) submitted that the Board of Education and the House of Commons ought not to take this Instruction from the House of Lords. He submitted that the order was purely an administrative measure, but the so-called constitutional party appeared to have strained the constitution of another place, perhaps out of follow feeling to a brother landowner, or it might be to flout the West Riding County Council, the most progressive local education authority throughout England and Wales. [OPPOSITION cries of "Oh."] He had two appeals to make. One to the House of Commons that it would assert its supremacy over administration as well as over finance, and he appealed to the President of the Board of Education, seeing that East Hardwick was a single school area, and there was no choice of schools for the parents to send their children to, to see that there should not be a new denominational school, privately controlled, in which the teachers should have to submit to sectarian tests, but that it should be a public elementary school 1319 provided by the local education authority. He begged to move.
§ *MR. SPEAKERMove what?
§ *MR. CLOUGHThat the Bill be recommitted.
§ *MR. SPEAKERIf the hon. Member had told me at the commencement that he was going to move the recommittal I should have told him that he was not entitled to do so now. I only permitted him to speak because I understood after a protest from him the Bill would go through unopposed. The time to take opposed Private Bills is 8.15 p.m., and not three o'clock in the afternoon.
§ *MR. CLOUGHIf you understood that, Sir, I shall not move.
§ Bill read the third time and passed, without Amendment.