HC Deb 29 January 1931 vol 247 cc1306-14

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. T. Kennedy.]

Lord EUSTACE PERCY

I want to raise a subject which I think is of very great importance. The President of the Board of Education has appointed a committee to inquire into the question of private schools. At the last general election the representatives of the Labour party gave an undertaking which I think the House should now be aware of, Writing on 8th May to the Association of Headmistresses, the present Foreign Secretary said this. The most important part of the communication from the Association of Headmistresses was a resolution: That in the interests of the education of the country it is essential that no private school shall be carried on which has not been inspected and licensed by the Board of Education. To that the Foreign Secretary replied: The full acceptance by the Labour party of the principle of equality of opportunity and the organisation of the educational system as a single and continuous whole from the nursery school to the university implies the inspection and licensing of private schools to ensure that they are an efficient part of the school system. I do not want to comment upon that very remarkable declaration except to point out that its logic would carry us very much beyond the subject to which it was primarily addressed, but clearly if the organisation of the educational system of a single and continuous whole from the nursery school to the university involves the inspection and licensing of the private school, it also involves the inspection and licensing of the university. The first question which I should like to ask the President of the Board of Education is whether that was made the policy of the Labour party and also of the present Government, and, if it is the policy of the present Government, what is the good of appointing a committee to consider a question which the Government have already prejudged?

I pass to the appointment of the committee itself. I do not want to express any opinion at all on the merits of the question of the treatment of private schools. It is a very large, a very important, and a very complicated ques- tion to which any Government must address itself in the present circumstances. I had formed very clear ideas of the way in which the problems should be tackled, and I had hoped to incorporate those ideas into the revision of the Education Act which I had promised. I am not going to enter into that question to-night, but, whatever may be the merits of the question, two things are clear: One is that it involves no mere question of educational administration but a very large question of public policy, because it involves the conversion of the Board of Education, which hitherto has always controlled education as a grant giving body, laying down the conditions for the receipt of Parliamentary grants, into a body which, quite apart from any grant giving functions, will be a controller, inspector and licenser of schools which it does not aid in any way at all.

The second thing I would say is that it is a question on which feeling and suspicion run high. It is a question which you can only solve by getting what right hon. Gentlemen have so often referred to in another connection, a general agreement and a general all-round settlement to ensure fair play being given all round to every type of school and every type of educational interest. The right hon. Gentleman has appointed a Committee and, to begin with, I want to say that I think he has been extraordinarily fair in the composition of the committee from the party political standpoint. There are, I think, only three, possibly four, members of the committee of whom one can say that they are members of the Labour party. I should think the majority of the committee are probably members of my own party; and he has been extremely fair in the composition of the committee as regards the Members of this House.

But the outstanding fact about this Committee is that, out of the 16 members, 12 are either members of education committees, officers of education authorities, or teachers in State schools or State-aided schools. Of the remaining four, two are official members of associations of private schools. Does not that show an extraordinary lack of imagination when you are dealing with a very tense state of feeling on this matter? You have ignored the whole range of public school education, as it is called in this country. You have ignored the universities completely, who are probably better able to judge than anyone else, the merits and demerits of private school education as compared with education in State and State-aided schools. You have ignored all the opportunities of mobilising on your side really responsible, independent, educational opinion; and you have preferred to appoint a purely bureaucratic Committee, representing the bureaucratic point of view.

Mr. EDE

He did not put the Noble Lord on it

Lord E. PERCY

No, and I quite agree that in leaving me off the Committee, the right hon. Gentleman has shown his single, solitary glimmer of imagination; but the hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede), who interposes, is the Chairman of the Committee. He is a Member whom we all greatly respect for his character and for his ability, but he would probably agree that he himself is not unfairly described when I say that he does represent more or less, let us say, the administrative point of view, the point of view of the administrator of a system of public education.

I must add this because I raised the point in my question to-day: It is also true, as the right hon. Gentleman has said, that seven out of the 16 members of the Committee are already more or less identified with particular views on this subject, on one side or the other. No one supposes that they would have become members of the Committee if they were not quite sure that they could bring an unprejudiced and impartial judgment to bear on the question before them, but at the same time one has to remember, in dealing with a committee of this kind, that the important thing is not merely that it should be impartial, but that it should be recognised on all hands as certainly impartial and that there should be no breath of an idea that any large section of the Committee had already prejudged the question.

It seems to me that on this question, in regard to this committee, the right hon. Gentleman has missed a great opportunity. I do not discuss now whether the setting up of the committee was necessary or not, or whether the right hon. Gentleman could not have taken his decision without the intervention of the committee, but if you were going to set up a committee you had a tremendous opportunity of mobilising, not only all that great body of opinion of the State-aided and State system of education and the public service of education, but you also had the opportunity of mobilising all that very public-spirited body of independent educational opinion which is just as anxious as any other section of opinion in the country to see that bad private schools are either brought up to standard or eliminated. All that great fund of public experience you have put on one side, and I felt bound to bring this ques- to the attention of the House and to express my regret that such an opportunity should have been so deplorably missed.

Mr. ANNESLEY SOMERVILLE

I speak as the president of the Private and Independent Schools Association, which is a body which represents in the largest and greatest degree the private schools. I feel great difficulty in offering any criticism of the composition of the Departmental Committee. It. contains several good friends of mine, and I have not the slightest doubt that the members of the committee will completely do their best to produce a just and useful report; but I am bound to say that collectively that committee does not command the confidence of the educational public. It certainly does not command the confidence of my association, and that lack of confidence is shared in other quarters. For instance, in the educational supplement of the "Times" of the 17th January, I find this passage: As to the scope of the inquiry, the wording of the terms of reference is important. The Committee is asked to report not whether legislation is necessary, but what legislation or other changes are desirable. The range of the Committee's activities is thus explicitly preliminary and exploratory. Had it been otherwise the work of investigation would surely have been assigned either to the Royal Commission or preferably to the Consultative Committee of the Board which both by its constitution and powers is particularly adapted for pronouncing an authoritative opinion on educational organisation and on the means of regulating it. I agree with my Noble Friend that the President of the Board of Education has lost a great opportunity. He has left out of the constitution of the Committee educational elements which ought to be represented. Of course one does not ask that the members of this Committee should be new delegates but one does ask that some of them at any rate should have real inside knowledge of the working of private schools. The private and independent Schools Association exists very largely on the elimination of inefficient private schools. We welcome inspection. We want our schools to be as efficient as possible and when the whole system—and it is a very large and important part of the educational system of the country—is being examined we ask that on the Committee that examines it there should be real inside knowledge. If you appoint, for instance, a Departmental Committee on the working of electric railways, you put on that Committee not merely outside people but experts who have worked on railways and understand them from the inside. There are only two members of the Committee who have that inside knowledge. That is one way in which we think the Committee fails, and it also fails because it has left out of account large fields which might be drawn upon for strengthening the Committee. Even now if the Minister could see his way to place on that Committee at least one other member with real inside knowledge of the working of private schools it would be valuable day by day, as the Committee sits, in examining witnesses and sifting evidence, and would greatly strengthen the Committee and increase the confidence that might be felt in the Committee by the education authorities.

Mr. EDE

I intervene as Chairman of the Committee because I am sincerely desirous that this Committee should not conduct its further work in the atmosphere of discredit that might be inflicted upon it by the discussion this evening. May I say quite frankly that I do not accept the view of our functions that has been given by the hon. Member for Windsor (Mr. A. Somerville)? We have had three sittings, and at each I have endeavoured to bring before the minds of all sections of the Committee my view that it is their duty to sit there with open minds, to hear the evidence, and to frame a report on the evidence. It is not for me to criticise the form in which the Committee has been set up I have received from the Independent Schools Association a letter in which they forwarded to me a copy of a resolution in which they say: The council of the Independent Schools Association protests against the constitution of the Departmental Committee on Private Schools, as it considers that those who have practical knowledge of the question are inadequately represented; and asks that further suitable appointments may be made, that the Committee may fully and impartially carry out the specific terms of reference to the Committee, as it doubtless desires. I reported to the Committee yesterday the following letter which I had sent in reply, and I understand that it was unanimously agreed to: I will report your resolution to the committee, but I must at once demur from any suggestion that the committee is unlikely to carry out impartially the specific terms of reference, and I desire, as chairman of the committee, to assure your association that we shall take every opportunity of considering all the facts submitted to us, and that our findings will be based on the consideration of such evidence, and nothing else. From my knowledge of the way in which the members have co-operated, that is the spirit in which they are approaching their task, but such expert knowledge as they have will not be obtruded on one another, and I cannot think of any more terrifying experience for myself as chairman than to preside, over a body of experts with different views on the same subject. We shall consider the views put before us in evidence and base our findings upon it. The hon. Member for Windsor has quoted from the "Times" Educational Supplement. I have the "Times" Educational Supplement of four weeks before, and that is plenty of time for modern journalism to complete a change of front. On the 13th December they wrote: Some departmental committees are appointed for the purpose of shelving awkward questions, but the President of the Board of Education told the House of Commons last month that he was fully alive to the importance of the subject. There is no need to take lengthy evidence. The existence of these insanitary and inefficient schools is fully admitted, and all that the committee has to do is recommend that the Board of Education should be given full statutory powers to inspect private schools, and power to delegate inspection to the local authority. A report to that effect will be looked for early in the New Year.

Mr. A. SOMERVILLE

That is before the Departmental Committee was appointed.

Mr. EDE

No, I am not endeavouring to mislead the House. It was after we were appointed. It was supposed to be welcoming us and assuring us that "a short life and a gay one" would be our best epitaph. I assure the House that that is not the spirit in which the Committee approaches its task. It believes that it has important, national work to do. It will approach it with an open mind. It will hear the evidence, sufficiently and impartially, and upon that will endeavour to submit a report which it hopes will be of use to the President of the Board during the many years in which he will remain at his office.

The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Sir Charles Trevelyan)

I am not sure that it is desirable that I should say much. I do not think the House has been much impressed by the Noble Lord. He began by quoting a letter from the Board of Education, which I have not seen. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] Everyone is perfectly aware that the Labour party are anxious about these private schools. Every decent educationist in the country knows that at least a small minority of the schools—we do not know how many—are untested, uncontrolled and unfit. The question is how many, and how they ought to be treated. It is a crime for me to appoint a Committee to do it. That apparently, is the Noble Lord's first point. The next thing in his speech is this: He says that he had clear ideas of the way in which the problem ought to be tackled, and that he would have incorporated them in a Bill—apparently without any inquiry. I prefer to know where I am going, and I prefer to get advice from a committee which I am certain is an impartial committee, and one which I think is probably a capable one.

The Noble Lord objects to the composition of the Committee. He says that it is bureaucratic. Why should it be a bureaucratic Committee because it has on it elementary school teachers, secondary school teachers and headmasters and headmistresses? There is a representative of the municipal corporations. I suppose that is bureaucratic. There is also one of His Majesty's Inspectors. There I admit bureaucracy. It has on it one medical officer of health. The local education authorities are represented and there is a director of education. The Independent Schools' Association is represented, and the preparatory schools, and then there are five Members of Parliament. Frankly, I did not consult the Noble Lord about the two members whom I asked to represent Labour on the Committee. I think that the hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) and the hon. Member for West Bermondsey (Dr. Salter) are very well respected Members of this House and very impartial. I did consult the Conservative Whips' Office about the Conservative Members who are on the Committee—the hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Beaumont) and the hon. Member for Chippenham (Captain Cazalet)—and I believe they give perfect satisfaction on the other side. I consulted the Liberal Whips in connection with the appointment of the hon. Member for East Birkenhead (Mr. White).

This is the Committee which has hardly been criticised at all, except by the Noble Lord. I do not know why he should be so dissatisfied. I am perfectly satisfied that the Committee is impartial in so far as we here can be impartial. The Chairman of the Committee is impartial. The hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) is a man who has strong opinions, as I have, as the Noble Lord has, but we do not begin to be partial in dealing with these things because we have certain strong opinions. We all know that we have strong opinions. The honourable impartiality which pervades this House, however, does not obliterate our strong opinions, but makes us all try to be fair. I am certain that this Committee is going to try to be impartial. It is no more committed to any particular opinion than any other set of 15 people that I could have appointed. I am perfectly certain that it is going to do its best and that the ability of the members of the Committee will result in that best providing a very useful piece of advice even for the Noble Lord if he had the opportunity of legislating.

Question put, and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at Twenty-nine minutes after Eleven o'Clock.