RURAL EDUCATION AND BETTER FEEDING OF SCHOOL CHILDREN. (Hansard, 9 June 1931)

§ Mr. MACQUISTEN

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to authorise educational authorities to acquire land and buildings and to erect buildings in rural areas for the purpose of boarding, educating, and training children; and for purposes connected therewith. This is a voluntary Measure. If the children from the towns are to be sent, as I propose, to live in the rural areas under the conditions suggested they must go of their own free will and with the free consent of their parents. Anything in the nature of compulsion would excite fierce hostility both from parents and children. My own view is that under our present education system the children living in the towns suffer very great handicaps, and it is impossible for them to be adequately fed. In a great many cases the children of the poorer-paid workers are sustained largely on bread and tea and margarine, and the result is that we have a C 3 race growing up. If the provisions of this Measure were adopted, in less than a generation we should have an A 1 population. What I am suggesting is that those authorities who are wise enough to do so should have the right to rent areas of land and to make provision for bringing up children there. They would engage a farmer to supervise the agricultural operations, a gardener to supervise the horticultural work and a poultry expert to look after the rearing of the fowls. The children themselves would be employed for brief periods of the day in doing the agricultural, horticultural and other work necessary to grow their own food supplies.

I believe this plan has already been adopted in the case of the Blue Coat School. The authorities of that school invested in a considerable area of land and, I believe, they grow all the food 826 which the pupils need. Those fortunate boys get practically unlimited supplies of the kind of food which is necessary for the rising generation. No great labour would be involved. The number of hours worked per week could be limited to from six to 10 hours. An hour or two a day would be adequate; with that amount of work they could produce all they required. Teachers would be residents there, and all the usual studies would be pursued. I can imagine nothing that would more delight the heart of a boy in his tender years than helping to rear the chickens and hens and rabbits and doing all the usual things that are done on a farm. The children would be growing their own food supplies and in unlimited quantities. Provision would be made that none of the produce should be sold, because that would lead to commercialisation, and there might be opportunities for exploiting the children.

Under this system all those children would grow up with a knowledge of agriculture instilled into them from their earliest years. Afterwards they could look about the world to see where they could get a bit of land for themselves and they would know what to do with it; they would know that with a comparatively small area of land a man can provide subsistence for himself. There is plenty of land for this purpose in this country. More land is falling out of cultivation in this country than would be necessary to support all these children if they were working for themselves. Some of my hon. Friends beside me have suggested that this is a Socialistic proposal and would cost a good deal of money. I do not think I have over heard anything quite so sensible coming from the other side, and, as it is a sensible suggestion, I hope that it will recommend itself to them. I do not think that there will be any particular expense, because if you had the children drawing their home supplies and feeding themselves they would be saving a great deal of the cost of providing their sustenance under present conditions. My object is to bring back the people to the land, because fanning is the finest occupation for anybody. [HON. MEMBERS: "Agreed!"] In this way you would get a first-class farming population, 827 and it is no good having that unless you train them.