§ 40. Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the President of the Board of Education what is his estimate of the annual cost of maintenance allowances on the proposed scale payable to parents of children in the last year after the anticipated raising of the school-leaving age, but without any means tests for working-class parents as defined in the Housing of the Working Classes Acts?
§ Sir C. TREVELYANI have been unable to obtain any data on which to base a reliable estimate of the proportion of parents who belong to the working classes as defined in the Housing Act, 1925, and I am, therefore, unable to give any estimate of the cost of awarding 2137 maintenance allowance to the children of such parents without a means test. The annual cost of awarding maintenance allowances to all the children in the schools, aged 14 to 15, at five shillings a week, without any means test, would amount to about £5,000,000 in the first full year after raising the leaving age.
§ Sir K. WOODCould not the right hon. Gentleman give some short account of the happy gathering which he addressed yesterday on this matter?
§ Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYDo I understand that the Minister of Education was at a Conservative meeting?
§ 43. Mr. ARNOTTasked the President of the Board of Education the estimated annual cost of providing maintenance allowances of 5s. per week for children between 14 and 15 years of age in attendance at secondary schools whose parents are exempted from Income Tax?
§ Sir C. TREVELYANThe Board's records do not include particulars of the numbers of children in secondary schools classified so as to show whether their parents are exempted from Income Tax, and I am, therefore, unable to give the estimate for which my hon. Friend asks.