Commons Sitting of 18 April 1932

Preamble
The House met at a Quarter before Three of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  INDIA.

    SITUATION.
    Mr. WARDLAW-MILNEasked the Secretary of State for India if he will give the House the latest information he has as to the political situation in India?
    Mr. T. WILLIAMSasked the Secretary of State for India whether he can make a statement in regard to the political situation in India?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (Sir Samuel Hoare): I am circulating a statement covering the events of the past week.
    Following is the statement:
    During the past week notable features were the recrudescence of Red Shirt activities in part of the Peshawar district and the celebration of National Week. At present the revival of the Red Shirt agitation is confined to that part of the Peshawar district north of the Kabul river, where, in the sub-divisions of Mardan and Charsadda, determined efforts to interfere with the elections by large crowds had considerable success. The situation in several districts necessitated reinforcement of the police by troops in dispersing the crowds, which were armed with lathis and which resorted freely to stone-throwing. In the area south-east of Mardan the police were compelled to fire. Here the police casualties were 12 injured, two seriously, while the casualties amongst the rioters were, as far as can be ascertained, one killed. On the conclusion of the poll the situation quieted.
    National Week was celebrated from the 6th to 13th April, Congress making special
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    efforts to rouse public interest. The results were singularly small. There were serious disorders at Allahabad where a procession on the 9th April resulted in a renewal of the disturbances mentioned last week. Owing to continued stone and brick throwing resort was had to fire, 30 rounds being discharged. Casualties were two killed and about 20 injured. The situation was, however, brought under control within two or three days. There was also activity at Cawnpore, but the position there has now been much improved by the introduction of an additional force of armed police into the cloth market area. Apart from slight hooliganism on the 13th April the week in Bombay City proved an almost complete failure. Picketing there has been on a reduced scale. Elsewhere throughout India the effects of National Week were negligible. Several provinces report that it passed almost unnoticed.

    GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS (PASSAGES IN FOREIGN SHIPS).
    Captain ERSKINE-BOLSTasked the Secretary of State for India how many passages during 1931 were made in foreign ships by British Government officials in India and by officials of his Department, respectively?
    Sir S. HOARE: No member of the India Office staff travelled to or from India in 1931 in a foreign ship. The further information asked for is not available in this country.

    EMPIRE AIR COMMUNICATIONS.
    Mr. CRAVEN-ELLISasked the Secretary of State for India whether he has now received any reply from the Indian Government as to whether arrangements are to be made for Indian delegates at the Ottawa Conference to have instructions from the Indian Government with regard to the extent to which it is prepared to co-operate with respect to the question of Empire air communications passing over Indian territory; and, if so, what is the nature of that reply?
    Sir S. HOARE: In response to my hon. Friend's suggestion of 6th April I am in communication with the Government of India by air mail on this matter, but I anticipate that it may be some little time before a reply is received.

    COMMUNAL QUESTION.
    Captain FULLERasked the Secretary of State for India if, before His Majesty's Government make an award on the communal question, they propose to make it a first condition that the acceptance of the award must be binding on all parties?
    Sir S. HOARE: The hon. and gallant Member will find that the statement made by the Prime Minister on behalf of His Majesty's Government on 1st December last did not imply that such a condition would have to be fulfilled before His Majesty's Government took action in this matter. However, the importance of such an acceptance by the communities, if it were feasible to secure it, would clearly be so great that the hon. and gallant Member can rest assured that any possibility of obtaining it will not be overlooked, though it is doubtful if it could be made a condition.

    BURMA.
    Captain FULLERasked the Secretary of State for India what steps the provincial government are taking to prevent the boycott in Burma of Indian shops now being carried out by Burmese?
    Sir S. HOARE: I am informed by the Government of Burma that no boycott of Indian shops by Burmese is taking place and that there are no indications of such a boycott being contemplated.
    Captain FULLER: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to receive information on this subject?
    Sir S. HOARE: Yes, certainly.
    Mr. T. WILLIAMS (for Mr. DAVID GRENFELL)asked the Secretary of State for India the present situation in regard to the disturbances in Burma?
    Sir S. HOARE: I am circulating a statement covering the events of the past week.
    Following is the statement:
    Myat Aung and his son Po Saw and one follower surrendered on 13th April with two guns and one revolver. Reports indicate that his gang has split up and that his followers are deserting. Bo We, one of the most important remaining leaders from Henzada, was shot near
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    Henzada, on the Tharrawaddy border, on 15th April. One civil police constable is reported to have been killed.
    Mr. WILLIAMS (for Mr. GRENFELL)asked the Secretary of State for India whether, in view of the desirability of making the forthcoming elections in Burma as representative as possible, new electoral rolls are being prepared to include those who have boycotted the previous elections to the Provincial Legislative Council?
    Sir S. HOARE: New electoral rolls have been prepared, and I hope that all persons entitled to vote at the forthcoming elections are, or will be, included in the lists. I have already addressed an inquiry to the Governor of Burma on the point.

    COMMITTEES.
    Mr. T. WILLIAMSasked the Secretary of State for India the total cost of the three committees now in India appointed to report on problems connected with the working out of the Government's proposals for Indian constitutional reform; and what part of this cost is to fall on British and Indian revenues, respectively?
    Sir S. HOARE: The estimated total cost of the present tour of the Franchise Committee of the Federal Finance Committee and States Inquiry Committee is about £36,500, of which about £15,000 will be met from British revenues.

    COTTON INDUSTRY (INQUIRY).
    Mr. COCKS (for Mr. RHYS DAVIES)asked the Secretary of State for India the terms of reference to the tariff board which has been ordered to make an inquiry into the question of protection for the Indian cotton-mill industry; and whether due consideration will be given to British interests?
    Sir S. HOARE: I must apologise for the length of this answer. The Tariff Board have been directed to examine the following questions and make recommendations regarding them:—(1) Whether the claim of the Indian cotton textile industry to protection has been established; (2) if the claim is found to be established, do what form protection should be given, and to what extent; (3) if protection by means of import

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    duties is recommended, then (a) whether the same rate of protection is required against competition of goods manufactured in the United Kingdom as against the competition of goods manufactured elsewhere, (b) what rates of duty are recommended on (i) cotton piece goods, (ii) piece goods made wholly or partly of artificial silk, (iii) cotton twist and yarn, according as they are manufactured in the United Kingdom and elsewhere. The Board has also been asked to consider how its recommendations will affect tine handloom weaving industry. The preamble states that since the Protection Act of 1930 was passed, three important changes have occurred. First, by two successive Finance Acts the duty on cotton piece goods has been raised for revenue purposes. Second, a very large increase has occurred in the imports of artificial silk goods. Third, the Government of India have decided to discuss at Ottawa the question whether Great Britain and India should enter into a preferential trade agreement. The preamble also includes a reference to a resolution passed by the Legislative Assembly in 1923 of which I am sending the hon. Member a copy. As regards the second part of the question, the hon. Member will see that the terms of reference are comprehensive.
    Mr. DOUGLAS HACKING: Has this committee yet had its first meeting, and when does my right hon. Friend think that it will be able to report?
    Sir S. HOARE: I am not sure whether the committee has actually met, but it is meeting in the very near future, and it is hoped that the report will not take very long.

    BUDDHISTS.
    Mr. MORGAN JONES (for Mr. McENTEE)asked the Secretary of State for India if he will give figures showing the number of Buddhists returned in the census taken in India in 1921 and in 1931; and what percentage of the persons so returned resided in Burma?
    Sir S. HOARE: The total number of Buddhists returned in the 1921 census was 11,571,268 in all-India, of whom 11,201,943 (nearly 97 per cent.) were in Burma. Comparable figures for 1931 are not yet available.

    KASHMIR
    Mr. COCKS (for Mr. RHYS DAVIES)asked the Secretary of State for India the present position arising out of the recent disturbances in Kashmir?
    Sir S. HOARE: I have nothing to add to the reply given to the hon. Member's question of the 5th April.

  YUGOSLAVIA.
  Captain ERSKINE-BOLSTasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the British representative in Yugoslavia has recently forwarded any report on the situation in the country which was formerly Montenegro; and, if so, whether he could state its nature?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. Eden): His Majesty's Minister in Belgrade, as part of his ordinary duties, keeps the Foreign Office fully informed of Yugo-Slav affairs. Nothing has, however, occurred in that part of Yugoslavia formerly known as Montenegro, which calls for any comment.

  HUNGARY (BRITISH INVESTORS).
  Sir ARTHUR MICHAEL SAMUELasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has arranged for the restoration to British owners of the remittances belonging to them recently detained in German banks while in transit from Budapest to London; and, if not, whether His Majesty's Government proposes to take further steps to obtain the restoration of these British-owned funds?
  Mr. EDEN: My right hon. Friend is clear that British bondholders have a very strong claim to the release of the funds to which my hon. Friend refers, and His Majesty's Ambassador in Berlin has again been instructed to press this point of view strongly on the German Government.
  Sir A. M. SAMUEL: In view of the statement made by the Under-Secretary, would it not be helpful if the Foreign Office issued a warning to British traders not to entrust their funds to German banks; if they do, they do so at their peril?
  Mr. EDEN: That is another question.

  CHINA AND JAPAN.
  Major-General Sir ALFRED KNOXasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether, in view of the danger of a breakdown of the Sino-Japanese negotiations owing to the refusal of China to discuss guarantees for the maintenance of order in Shanghai, on which Japan insists, he will invite interested Powers to join with His Majesty's Government in negotiations with China to arrange for the future stability of Shanghai on the lines of Mr. Justice Feetham's recent report and recommendations?
  Mr. EDEN: According to my information the point on which difficulty is being experienced in concluding the negotiations is not that suggested by my hon. and gallant Friend. I am afraid that the issue of any invitation such as he contemplates would only add to the difficulties of these negotiations, which it is the general desire to see brought to a successful conclusion as soon as possible.
  Sir A. KNOX: Is it not the fact that the Japanese occupation will continue as long as there is no stability for the future of Shanghai and could not this country build a bridge between China and Japan and bring the two parties together by arranging something with the other 14 Treaty Powers?
  Mr. EDEN: The hon. and gallant Member is under a misapprehension as to the point which is now delaying negotiations. We want to get these negotiations settled before we consider embarking on anything else.
  Mr. COCKS: Is not the disorder aggravated by the presence of the Japanese army in Shanghai? Is it not possible to get the Japanese army removed?
  Mr. EDEN: I do not think we will help matters by entering into the merits of the case.
  Captain GUNSTON: Is the Under-Secretary in a position to say whether there have been any further outbreaks in China?
  Mr. HANNONasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what is the present attitude of the Japanese Government to participation in discussions at Geneva on the Shanghai peace terms; and
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  what further steps are contemplated by His Majesty's Government towards the adjustment of the difficulties which have arisen at the conference at Shanghai?
  Mr. COCKSasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he will make a statement regarding the suspension of the negotiations for the withdrawal of the Japanese army from Shanghai?
  Mr. EDEN: I cannot say what is the attitude of the Japanese Government in this respect. The Chinese Government have referred a point arising out of the negotiations to Geneva where it is under discussion. Pending the outcome of these discussions, in which my right hon. Friend is taking part, I am unable to make any further statement.
  Mr. HANNON: Has the Under-Secretary received any intimation of any further trouble and fighting or squabbling in this disturbed area?
  Mr. EDEN: No, Sir; only reports of fighting among Chinese troops themselves, which turned out on investigation to be a mock battle staged by the 5th Chinese Army for the benefit of the Fox Movietone Company of America.
  Mr. HOLFORD KNIGHT: Has the Under-Secretary seen the Press reports to-day of one of the parties concerned declining to assist the Assembly's inquiry; and can he assure the House that the Government will insist on the inquiry proceeding?
  Mr. EDEN: I have seen some Press reports, which do not accurately represent the position.
  Mr. COCKSasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has taken note of the communication of the Chinese delegation to the League of Nations on 22nd March to the effect that the Japanese are arranging a Customs union between Manchuria and Japan; and whether he has received any reports on the subject from our consular agents in Manchuria?
  Mr. EDEN: As already stated in this House, my right hon. Friend has seen the communication in question. The Japanese delegate at Geneva has informed the Secretary-General of the League of Nations in reply that the report of a proposed Customs union

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  between Japan and Manchuria is inaccurate. The answer to the second part of the question is in the negative.
  Mr. COCKS: Will the hon. Member ask our Consul-General in Manchuria for a report on the subject?
  Mr. EDEN: I am confident that if there is anything to report our Consul-General will report.
  Mr. COCKSasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is now able to inform the House of the terms of the communication received from the Japanese Government with regard to the questions of the application of Article 15 of the Covenant of the League of Nations to the Manchurian question and Japan's withdrawal from the League?
  Mr. EDEN: No, Sir. I can add nothing to the reply given to the hon. Member on the 13th of April.
  Mr. COCKS: Is it not undesirable that information should be made known in Tokio which is withheld from the House of Commons; and will the hon. Member inform the Japanese Government of this so that permission may be given for the information to be given here?
  Mr. EDEN: This is a confidential communication and a confidential communication is treated as confidential.
  Mr. COCKS: Is it right that confidential communications should be kept from the House of Commons?
  Mr. EDEN: There can be no diplomacy, open or secret, without confidential communications.

  DANUBIAN COUNTRIES (ECONOMIC RESTORATION).
  Mr. HANNONasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he can make any statement on future action in relation to the Danubian states following upon the meeting of the Council of the League of Nations which took place on the 15th instant; and if the report of the League Financial Committee on this matter will be published?
  Mr. EDEN: The report of the League Financial Committee, which has already
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  been published, was considered by the Council on the 12th and 15th of April. As regards the concerted financial measures recommended by the Committee, the Council adopted the following resolution:
  "The Council notes that, in view of the gravity of the present crisis, the Financial Committee recommends certain proposals for the organisation under appropriate conditions of concerted financial action.
  The Council is informed that the British, French, German and Italian Governments, after an exchange of views during the recent London Conference, agreed that, before they could arrive at any conclusion on these proposals, it would be necessary for them to have the report of the Financial Committee examined by their governmental representatives who would advise them on the action which should be taken so far as they were concerned, and that these Governments request the Council to agree that their representatives should enter into consultation with the Chairman of the Financial Committee and with the Technical Organisations of the League.
  The Council accordingly authorises the Financial Committee and the Technical Organisations of the League to collaborate with the aforesaid governmental representatives and to give them any assistance required during their investigations.
  It will, of course, rest with the Council to decide on the action to be taken on the report, and for this purpose it will be placed again on their agenda for the next meeting."
  I understand that the Governmental Committee is meeting this week.
  Mr. HANNON: In thanking my hon. Friend for his comprehensive reply, may I ask when we may expect some results from these further inquiries?
  Mr. EDEN: I cannot do that beyond saying that the committee is meeting this week. We shall have to wait the result of their conference.

  TRADE AND COMMERCE.

    FRENCH INDUSTRIES.
    Mr. HANNONasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if his attention has been called to the issue in France of a report by the National Office for Foreign Trade, which embodies criticisms of British methods and institutions with the object of preventing French industries from transferring some of their activities to this country; and if any action has been taken in the matter?
    Mr. EDEN: I am aware of the issue of this report in the weekly journal of the Office National du Commerce Extérieur in France. I understand that it was prompted by the consideration that French manufacturers might transfer their activities to this country to an important extent. I have not, however, yet received the full text of the report in question, which I am taking steps to obtain; and it has not at present been considered necessary to take further action in the matter.
    Mr. HANNON: Will the Under-Secretary assure the House that the Foreign Office is carefully watching these transactions, and that no differential treatment of this country will take place without a protest being made in Paris?
    Mr. EDEN: The fact that we have asked for a report shows that we are watching the matter.
    Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Does the hon. Member believe that we are really short of manufactures in this country?
    Mr. EDEN: We are short of employment.

    FISH AND FISH MEAL (EXPORTATION).
    Sir A. M. SAMUELasked the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department if any steps have been taken by his Department to open up markets for fish and fish meal for human consumption in Africa, the Levant and the East?
    Mr. JOHN COLVILLE (Secretary, Overseas Trade Department): I am considering these questions in consultation with my right hon. and gallant Friend the Minister of Agriculture. I am not in a position to make any statement as to conclusions in regard to the proposed action.

    BRITISH INDUSTRIES FAIR.
    Mr. HERBERT WILLIAMSasked the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department if he can state the accumulated deficit in respect of the British Industries Fair to 31st March, 1932, or to the latest available date; and what have been the total grants to the same date in respect of publicity?
    Mr. COLVILLE: It is estimated that the accumulated net deficit for the period of 18 years from 1915–1932 inclusive will amount to about £21,000. It should be
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    borne in mind, however, that losses attributable to the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley in 1924 and the Cotton Textile Exhibition at the White City in 1931 amounted to more than £22,000. It will thus be evident that without these two items there would have been a net gain. The total grants in respect of publicity to 31st March, 1932, amount to approximately £166,000.
    Mr. H. WILLIAMS: Is it not a fact that there has been a total loss of £187,000 on this exhibition compared with what might have been the case if it had been run on commercial lines?
    Mr. COLVILLE: There are two particular items over which my Department has not direct control, making a total of £22,000 in amount.
    Mr. MABANE: Could the hon. Gentleman say whether the exhibition made a profit or a loss in the current year?
    Mr. COLVILLE: It is anticipated that when the accounts are completed they will show a profit for this year.
    Mr. H. WILLIAMSasked the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department if he can state the method whereby the proposed publicity levy in connection with the British Industries Fair will be made?
    Mr. COLVILLE: The question of the provision of money to defray the cost of publicity for the British Industries Fair of 1933 is receiving consideration, and I hope to be able to make a statement on the subject shortly.
    Mr. ANSTRUTHER-GRAYasked the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department whether any section of the British Industries Fair has ever been held in Scotland; and whether he will consider the advisability of making inquiries as to the practicability of holding a section of this fair on Scottish soil in future years?
    Mr. COLVILLE: A section of the British Industries Fair was organised in Glasgow by the municipality of that city in 1917, 1918, 1920 and 1921. Following a strong recommendation in favour of centralisation of the Fair, made in 1921 by a committee appointed by the Board of Trade, under the chairmanship of the late Sir Frank Warner, the Glasgow section was discontinued, and this had the

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    approval of the Glasgow Chamber of Commerce who shared the view held by the majority of the bodies consulted that the aim should be the greatest concentration of overseas buyers in one place. In view of the recommendation in question and of the recent report of the committee under the chairmanship of Lord Chelmsford, I doubt the wisdom of any policy of decentralisation.
    Mr. ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: Does that objection apply to a Scottish national industrial exhibition held in Scotland?
    Mr. COLVILLE: No, Sir. I think such an exhibition might do a lot of good. It should be held at a different date from the fair in London. I should be interested to hear further suggestions on the proposal.

    EXHIBITION, TORONTO.
    Mr. LYONSasked the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department if His Majesty's Government will be directly associating in the organisation or display at the next Canadian National Exhibition at Toronto?
    Mr. COLVILLE: His Majesty's Government will not be directly associated in the organisation or display at the Canadian National Exhibition to be held at Toronto from the 26th August to the 10th September next. The Department of Overseas Trade proposes, however, to have, as is has had for several years, an inquiry and information bureau at the exhibition, under the direction of His Majesty's Trade Commissioner at Toronto.
    Mr. LYONS: In view of the advantages likely to accrue to British trade in that exhibition, will the hon. Gentleman say whether the matter will be considered at the forthcoming Ottawa Conference?
    Mr. COLVILLE: For this particular year it is not anticipated that the exhibition will be discussed, as there is no money available in the exhibitions grant, but I will take into consideration my hon. Friend's suggestion.

    IMPORT DUTIES ACT.
    Major NATHANasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the date of the recommendation made by the Tariff Advisory Committee to the Treasury, and the date of the Order made by the
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    Treasury, with regard to adding foreign postage stamps to the free list under the the Import Duties Act; and when the same will be submitted to the House of Commons for approval?
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Major Elliot): No recommendation on the subject of imported foreign postage stamps has been received from the Import Duties Advisory Committee, and the last part of the question does not therefore arise. I may say, however, that in view of the considerable doubt as to the liability of postage stamps to duty under the Import Duties Act, my right hon. Friend has decided that no charge to general ad valorem duty should be made.
    Major NATHAN: Can the right hon. and gallant Gentleman say how it is that, in view of the provisions of the Import Duties Act, any goods are allowed into this country except subject to the terms of that Act?
    Major ELLIOT: It was a matter of grave doubt whether used postage stamps were in fact goods.
    Mr. HACKINGasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his attention has been called to the difficulties of the Board of Customs in connection with six animals which recently arrived at Folkestone; and whether, in order to allay public anxiety, he will state whether for the purposes of the Import Duties Act, 1932, a monkey is a quadruped or a quadrumanous mammal?
    Major ELLIOT: I am not aware that the Board of Customs and Excise has experienced any difficulties in the matter. I am informed that they decided some time ago that live monkeys were not liable to duty.
    Mr. HACKING: Is my right hon. and gallant Friend aware that his answer will cause great disappointment in the minds of those directly concerned?

    DANUBIAN COUNTRIES.
    Mr. CHORLTONasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury whether he has considered the resolution of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, which has been sent to him, with reference to frozen remittances in countries like the Danubian States; and what steps he proposes

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    to take to ensure that some clearing house or other scheme is brought into force as soon as possible to benefit the trade of this country?
    Mr. COLVILLE: I have been asked to reply. The resolution to which the hon. Member refers has been received. I am examining the whole question in consultation with business interests, but. I cannot at the moment make any further pronouncement.
    Mr. CHORLTON: Can my bon. Friend say if he has been in contact with the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, and will he take into account what has taken place in Germany and France with regard to clearing-house arrangements, whereby their traders have an advantage over ours?
    Mr. COLVILLE: As regards the first part of the supplementary question, I am in consultation with the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, and that chamber has supplied useful information for our consideration. As regards the second part, I am aware of certain clearing schemes, but our information has not been that they are satisfactory, and would point out that the Board of Trade returns recently published show a slight increase in our exports to Austria and Hungary in the first two months of this year.
    Sir A. M. SAMUEL: Is my hon. Friend aware that this is a matter which does not admit of any delay? If Manchester cannot obtain payment for goods already sold, it is impossible to continue to export cotton goods to South Eastern Europe.
    Mr. COLVILLE: I have pointed out that, in spite of all these difficulties, our export trade with these countries is being maintained.
    Major NATHAN: In view of the length of time that has elapsed since the matter was brought to the attention of the hon. Gentleman, when will he be in a position to make a definite statement?
    Mr. COLVILLE: I can only say that the matter is under close and constant review, in consultation with those very interests which are most affected, and that I will make a statement as soon as I possibly can.
    Mr. HANNON: Is it a fact that France and Germany have made clearinghouse arrangements with the Danubian States, and cannot something be done by this country?
    Mr. COLVILLE: This country has maintained its exports with the Danubian countries, in spite of the difficulties, and our information does not show that these clearing schemes are working satisfactorily.

  NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.
  Captain CROOKSHANKasked the Minister of Pensions (1) what is the nature of the inquiry into the incomes of persons applying for need pensions;
  (2) the number of persons receiving pensions on the grounds that if the deceased son were still alive he would have been contributing towards the maintenance of his parents;
  (3) how many persons have surrendered war pensions awarded to them on the basis of what might have been their deceased son's contribution to the household; and what reasons, if any, they have given for such surrender?
  Mr. HUTCHISONasked the Minister of Pensions how many parents are now in receipt of a maximum used pension of 20s. a week; and, how many need pensions of any sort have been granted within the last 12 months?
  The MINISTER of PENSIONS (Major Tryon): All war pensions to parents are based, directly or indirectly, on the contribution which it might be assumed the deceased son would have been making had be survived. With regard to the class of pensions referred to as need pensions, inquiry is directed to ascertaining the means of support from all sources available to an applicant, regard being had to the liability of support from surviving children. There were at the 31st March last about 3,500 parents in receipt of need pensions at the maximum rate of 20s. a week out of an aggregate of about 32,000 pensioners of this class. About 600 pensions of this class, at all rates within the maximum, have been granted within the last 12 months.

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  The two remaining classes of pensions Ito parents are those which have been granted in the past on the basis of pre-War dependence on the deceased son, and the flat-rate pension of 5s. a week formerly granted to a parent or parents of an unmarried son under 26 years of age. The recipients of these two classes of pension numbered approximately 159,000 and 79,000 respectively at the 31st March last. I have no record of the total number of parents who have relinquished pension in the two last-named classes, though I understand that ordinarily some half-dozen cases of surrender occur in the course of a year, and usually on ground of improved financial circumstances having rendered the pension unnecessary. Since September last, however, 117 pensioners of these classes have, on patriotic grounds, surrendered their pensions, either in whole or in part, as a contribution to the National emergency.
  Captain CROOKSHANK: While thanking the Minister for his reply, may I ask if he has had any complaints from any of these recipients of pensions as to the nature of the inquiry into their needs?
  Major TRYON: I think there are difficulties with reference to any inquiry. It is obvious that these inquiries are necessary, because we want to ascertain the right amount of pension to pay.
  Captain CROOKSHANK: There has been no objection to the amount that the deceased son might have contributed to the family income being taken into account?
  Major TRYON: No, Sir.

  FISHING INDUSTRY.
  Sir A. M. SAMUELasked the Minister of Agriculture whether he proposes to act on paragraphs 87 to 90 of the Fishing Industry Report [Cmd. 4012], 1932, by adopting the principles of the Horticultural Sales Act, 1926, so as to prevent abuses detected by the Food Council arising from the fact that fish salesmen act as merchants, buying and selling on their own account, and as commissioned salesmen on behalf of port wholesale merchants?
  The MINISTER of AGRICULTURE (Sir John Gilmour): As I intimated in
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  reply to a question by my hon. Friend on Wednesday last, I am considering the report referred to, in consultation with other Ministers concerned, and I regret I cannot anticipate what conclusions may be reached in regard to any of the recommendations contained therein.
  Sir A. M. SAMUEL: Will the right hon. Gentleman say whether he is considering specifically this point, or whether this particular matter will be dealt with in the general examination of the report?
  Sir J. GILMOUR: I hope to examine the report in detail.

  AGRICULTURE.

    REORGANISATION COMMISSIONS.
    Captain PETER MACDONALDasked the Minister of Agriculture if he can now make any statement with regard to the progress of re-organisation of the milk, potato, and pig industries of the Country?
    Brigadier-General CLIFTON BROWNasked the Minister of Agriculture what steps he has taken to set up a milk re-organisation committee; and whether he can yet give the names of any appointments to that Commission?
    Colonel RUGGLES-BRISEasked the Minister of Agriculture (1) if he can state the personnel of the Milk Re-organisation Commission and the terms of reference;
    (2) if he can state the personnel of the Bacon Re-organisation Commission and the terms of reference?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: I have constituted an Agricultural Marketing Re-organisation Commission for Milk. The duty of this Commission will be to prepare a scheme or schemes under the Agricultural Marketing Act, 1931, to be applicable in England and Wales for regulating the marketing of milk. I have directed that the Commission in the course of preparing a scheme as aforesaid shall:—

    (a) investigate the extent to which its operation could be facilitated by cooperation between the board administering it and any corresponding body in Scotland or Northern Ireland;

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    (b) investigate any other matter affecting its operation; and

    (c) make recommendations with respect to the matters investigated.

    The composition of the Commission will be:—
    Chairman:

    Sir Edward Grigg, K.C.M.G., K.C.V.O., D.S.O., M.C.

    Members:

    Professor A. W. Ashby, M.A.

    F. N. Blundell, Esq.

    A. E. Cutforth, Esq., C.B.E.

    Major-General Sir Philip Nash, K.C.M.G., C.B.

    The Secretary of State for Scotland and I are about to appoint an Agricultural Marketing Reorganisation Commission for Pigs and Pig Products.
    The duty of this Commission will be to prepare a scheme or schemes, under the Agricultural Marketing Act, 1931, to be applicable in Great Britain for regulating the marketing of pigs and any pig products. We shall direct that the Commission in the course of preparing a scheme as aforesaid shall

    (a) investigate the extent to which its operation could be facilitated by co-operation between the board administering it and any corresponding body in Northern Ireland;

    (b) investigate the manner in which its operation could be facilitated by the quantitive regulation of imports of pigs and bacon and by similar or different measures affecting other pig products;

    (c) investigate the manner in which such regulation could best be undertaken in the public interest;

    (d) investigate any other matter affecting the operation of any such scheme; and

    (e) make recommendations with respect to the matters investigated.

    The composition of the Commission will be:—
    Chairman:

    Colonel The Right Hon. G. R. Lane Fox, P.C., J.P., D.L.

    Members:

    H. G. Howitt, Esq.,

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    Lieut.-Colonel Sir Wyndham Portal, Bart., M.V.O., D.S.O.,

    The Hon. Jasper Ridley,

    and a Scottish member whose name will be announced in the course of a few days.
    It will be left to the discretion of the Commissions to decide in what manner and to what extent they obtain expert advice from the interests concerned.
    I have not been asked by producers to appoint a Reorganisation Commission for potatoes and I understand that producers are themselves considering proposals for dealing with the marketing of this commodity.
    I am contemplating the introduction of amending legislation to provide that, in certain circumstances, the cost incurred in preparing schemes whether by a Reorganisation Commission or by other persons shall be a charge upon a marketing board consequently set up.
    Captain MACDONALD: When is it anticipated that these commissions will start operations?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: Almost immediately.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: Will there be a reorganisation committee for milk, for Scotland?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: No, Sir. I understand that the position in Scotland is that a scheme is already in an advanced stage of preparation.
    Mr. T. WILLIAMS: In regard to the first-mentioned commission, will its terms of reference enable it to deal with milk products?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: Yes, Sir, certainly.
    Brigadier-General BROWN: Does the right hon. Gentleman think there is any chance of this Milk Commission, when it is set up, being able to make any arrangements for next year's milk contracts, or whether the milk producers will have to look forward to making their own milk contracts under the same conditions as heretofore in September next for the year 1932–33?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: It is difficult to forecast the exact length of the inquiry, but I hope that there will be no delay.
    Colonel RUGGLES-BRISE: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether one or

    1243
    both of these commissions will have power to make direct application to the Tariff Advisory Committee?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: No, Sir. I do not think that they would work in that way.
    Mr. MACPHERSON: If a reorganisation committee for potatoes is appointed, will the right hon. Gentleman consider the advisability of having more than one Scottish member on it?

    BARLEY.
    Lord SCONEasked the Minister of Agriculture if he is now in a position to state the policy of the Government in regard to barley?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: The possibility of discriminating between imported malting and feeding barley is still under consideration. I would remind my Noble Friend that all foreign imported barley has been chargeable to a 10 per cent. ad valorem duty since 1st March.

    MILK (IMPORTS).
    Sir CHARLES CAYZERasked the Minister of Agriculture whether, in view of the fact that the quantity of milk imported into Great Britain was greater during the first three months of 1932 than for similar periods in 1931 or 1930, he can state whether it is intended to take any early action in the matter, more especially as the greater proportion of such imports were not affected by the Import Duties Act?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: I am aware that the total imports of all kinds of milk in the first three months of 1932 have been somewhat higher than in the corresponding periods of 1931 and 1930, but it would appear to be the case that the increase has taken place in those descriptions which have been affected by the Import Duties Act. I would, however, draw the attention of my hon. Friend to the statement which I have just made with regard, inter alia, to the setting up of a Re-organisation Commission for Milk.
    Sir C. CAYZER: Has the question of milk imports been before the Advisory Committee, and has the right hon. Gentleman received any recommendations on the subject?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: I must have notice of that question.
    Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Is it not the case that there was a shortage of milk during the period 1931–32?
    Brigadier-General BROWN: Is not the reason that importations were lower the fact that the price was lowered in this country; and is not that the reason of the shortage?

  BEET-SUGAR FACTORIES (MACHINERY).
  Lieut.-Colonel SANDEMAN ALLENasked the Minister of Agriculture how much of the machinery in beet-sugar factories which receive the subsidy is British made?
  Sir J. GILMOUR: On a cost basis, about 80 per cent. of the plant and machinery, installed in British beet-sugar factories up to 31st March, 1931, for the manufacture of sugar and molasses from home-grown beet, is British made.
  Lieut.-Colonel SANDEMAN ALLEN: Can the right hon. Gentleman assure the House that in future the machinery in subsidised factories will be 100 per cent. British?
  Sir J. GILMOUR: The terms of the Act under which the present subsidies run lay it down that at least 75 per cent. must be made in this country.

  IMPERIAL ECONOMIC CONFERENCE.
  Brigadier-General BROWNasked the Minister of Agriculture whether any representatives of the agricultural industry in this country are accompanying the deputation to the Ottawa Conference; and what steps are being taken beforehand to ensure that British agricultural interests are safeguarded in our own home markets against increased Dominion competition?
  Sir J. GILMOUR: Arrangements are being made for the inclusion of a representative of home agriculture with the business advisers who will accompany the official delegation to the Ottawa Conference. I am already in touch with representative organisations on this subject,

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  and my hon. and gallant Friend can rest assured that home agricultural interests will be duly safeguarded.
  Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Will the agricultural workers have any representatives attending Ottawa?
  Sir J. GILMOUR: I could not say that.

  POST OFFICE.

    BUSINESS REPLY SERVICE.
    Mr. PEATasked the Postmaster-General the date upon which the proposed business reply service will be introduced?
    The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Sir Kingsley Wood): The business reply service is being introduced to-day.

    SAVINGS BANK ACCOUNTS.
    Captain FULLERasked the Postmaster-General the number of savings bank accounts with deposits up to £100 which have been closed since October, 1931?
    Sir K. WOOD: It is estimated that 195,000 accounts with balances up to £100 were closed, in the months of November, 1931, to March, 1932. This figure excludes coupon accounts in which the balances are under £1.

    SUS-POSTMASTERS (REMUNERATION).
    Mr. MALLALIEUasked the Postmaster-General what is the money value of the payment per hour for the receiving and sorting of mails and the early morning attendance of country sub-postmasters; and what is their payment per bag for the receiving and despatching of mails?
    Sir K. WOOD: The mail work is intermittent and does not lend itself to hourly rates of pay. It is covered by unit credits which vary according to the volume and character of the work, and are incorporated in the general unit scale on which the remuneration of sub-postmasters is based. The scale of remuneration for mail work is at present under discussion with the National Federation of Sub-Postmasters.

    ELECTION ADDRESSES (DISTRIBUTION).
    Mr. H. WILLIAMSasked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that many Parliamentary candidates arrange
    1246
    for the distribution of their election addresses in addressed envelopes by voluntary workers; and whether, in view of a recent prosecution of a man who had distributed a number of addresed circulars, it is the intention to prosecute Parliamentary candidates who, in future, distribute election addresses in the way described?
    Sir K. WOOD: The practice of distributing election addresses in addressed envelopes by voluntary workers ordinarily comes within the statutory exceptions to the Postmaster-General's exclusive privilege of carrying letters, and is therefore not an infringement of the law.

    IMPERIAL AIRWAYS (MAILS).
    Captain NORTHasked the Postmaster-General the number of letters and letter-packages carried each week by Imperial Airways since the introduction of the through service to South Africa, giving the name of the Colony or Dominion in each case to which the letters were directed?
    Sir K. WOOD: No figures are available regarding the number of letters carried, but the average weekly weight of the outward letter mail is 310 lb., of which 69 lb. is carried to Egypt, 26 lb. to the Sudan, 114 lb. to Kenya and Uganda, 26 lb. to Tanganyika, 23 lb. to Northern and Southern Rhodesia and 52 lb. to South Africa.

    TELEPHONES (RENTAL).
    Mr. MORGAN JONES (for Mr. McENTEE)asked the Postmaster-General whether his Department are considering any reduction in the rental of telephones?
    Sir K. WOOD: In view of the relatively small surplus on the telephone account, I regret that a, reduction in the charges for rental is at present impracticable. I may add that during the past 10 years reductions in telephone rates have been made amounting in the aggregate to over £6,000,000 a year.

  SUNDAY PERFORMANCES (REGULATION) BILL.
  Lieut.-Colonel APPLINasked the Prime Minister whether he will now consider the advisability of withdrawing the Sunday Performances (Regulation) Bill,

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  in view of the feeling in the country and the small majority it received on the Second Reading in this House?
  The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald): I am not in a position to make any statement in regard to this Bill.
  Sir WILLIAM DAVISON: Is not opinion in the country overwhelmingly in favour of localities where it is desired to have Sunday concerts or Sunday cinema performances being allowed to have them?
  The PRIME MINISTER: That question is covered by the answer which I have already given.
  Mr. HANNON: Is it not the case that there is a very strong feeling in the country against the Bill?
  Mr. COCKS: Will the Prime Minister appoint another Royal Commission to inquire into this matter?
  Mr. DENVILLE: Arising out of the right hon. Gentleman's reply, may I draw the attention of the House—
  HON. MEMBERS: No.

  AIR SERVICES (AUSTRALIA).
  Mr. CRAVEN-ELLISasked the Under-Secretary of State for Air whether negotiations with regard to extending the Indian air service to Australia have yet been favourably concluded with the Governments concerned; and how soon an air-mail service to Australia, which is required by the commercial community, is likely to be put in operation?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for AIR (Sir Philip Sassoon): The position is still as stated in the reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Mr. Lewis) on 16th September last.

  SCOTLAND.

    MILK (MARKETING).
    Mr. ANSTRUTHER-GRAYasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has received a copy of the draft scheme for milk-marketing in Scotland; and by what date it will be possible to bring this scheme into operation?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Major Sir Archibald Sinclair): The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative. I understand that good progress is being made with the drafting of the scheme, but I cannot at this date answer the second part of the question.

    MUNICIPAL UNDERTAKINGS (VALUATION).
    Mr. ANSTRUTHER-GRAYasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has yet received a deputation from the Convention of Royal Burghs on the subject of the valuation of municipal undertakings in Scotland?
    Sir A. SINCLAIR: Yes, Sir.

  ALIENS (CIRCUS PERFORMERS).
  Mr. GROVESasked the Minister of Labour if he is aware of the depression in the amusement world and that many of the workers and artistes cannot find employment; whether he will state the reasons why his Department has recommended the granting of permits for the entry of a German circus to make a tour of this country; and whether, seeing that there are three English circuses now working this country, he will cancel the proposed permits?
  Mr. NEIL MACLEANasked the Minister of Labour on what grounds he has granted a permit to a foreign circus to tour this country and give performances; whether he can state the number of artistes accompanying the circus; how long the permit extends; and whether there are any unemployed circus performers in this country?
  Sir COOPER RAWSONasked the Minister of Labour how long and under what conditions permission is being granted to the German circus, Gleich, to enter this country and give performances?
  Sir W. DAVISONasked the Minister of Labour whether, in recommending the granting of a permit to enable a German circus to go on tour through Great Britain, he took into consideration the number of British circus artistes who are out of employment and the efforts which have recently been made to secure employment for them in touring British circuses?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of LABOUR (Mr. R. S. Hudson): My right hon. Friend's decision to issue permits in respect of the circus Gleich was taken on the ground that its admission would provide additional employment for British workers. On the information before him he has no reason to think that its admission would prejudice the interests of similar entertainers in this country. The permits will be issued for a period of six months, subject to satisfactory assurances as to the number of British workers, including artistes, to be engaged. I cannot yet give the exact numbers.
  Mr. GROVES: Has the hon. Gentleman accepted assurances from this German circus that they will employ only British labour; and is he aware that the orchestra itself comprises the people who, while they work the pulleys of the tents, are also musicians, who get into this country under that pretext?
  Mr. HUDSON: Very great care will be taken by my right hon. Friend to see that the maximum number of British workmen are employed by this circus.
  Mr. HANNON: Has any inquiry been made as to whether the Germans will reciprocate and allow our circuses to travel in Germany?
  Sir C. RAWSON: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that a great deal of this circus consists of performing animals—much more so than British circuses, which have tried to limit animal performances?
  Mr. HUDSON: I have no information on that point.
  Mr. GROVES: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the hon. Gentleman's replies and the information in my possession, I propose to raise this matter on the Adjournment at the first possible opportunity.

  CINEMATOGRAPH FILMS (COLONIES).
  Captain ERSKINE-BOLSTasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the new film advisory committee set up for the purpose of considering suitable films for the Colonies has yet actually passed any such films for public exhibition; and whether it is intended to make a public announcement as to the names and nature of such approved films?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Sir Robert Hamilton): The committee to which my hon. Friend refers is not under Government control. It was nominated by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to assist the British United Film Producers Company, Limited, in the selection of suitable films for exhibition in the Colonies and to advise the company generally on questions relating to the distribution of such films. The committee is of an advisory nature only and is not intended to replace the local censorship authorities. The last part of the question does not therefore arise.

  DARTMOOR PRISON (DISTURBANCES).
  Mr. JOELasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether any decision has yet been reached as to the manner in which those convicts who gave assistance to the authorities in the recent mutiny at Dartmoor are to be rewarded.
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir Herbert Samuel): I contemplate recommending to His Majesty special remissions of the sentences of certain convicts in respect of their meritorious behaviour during the disturbance, but it would be undesirable to arrive at final decisions, or to inform the convicts concerned, until after the conclusion of the trial of those convicts against whom criminal proceedings have been instituted.

  NATIONAL FINANCE.

    INCOME TAX.
    Mr. POTTERasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in view of the hardship caused to certain Surtax payers by the assessment to Income Tax of profits made in the year prior to the financial crisis on which liability for Surtax arises in the following year in which a loss may have occurred, he will be prepared to make provision in the forthcoming Finance Act empowering the Special Commissioners of Income Tax to grant relief in specific cases?
    Major ELLIOT: As my hon. Friend is no doubt aware, there are various provisions of the Income Tax Acts designed to afford an appropriate measure of relief

    1251
    by reference to trading losses sustained in or before the year of assessment. Where under these provisions a. Surtax payer is given relief in respect of Income Tax at the standard rate for any year of assessment, relief in respect of Surtax for that year automatically follows. My right hon. Friend oculd not see his way to introduce legislation providing for a remission of tax charged for any year by reference to a loss sustained after that year. Under the established practice individual cases of proved inability to pay at the due date would always receive consideration administratively with a view to such arrangements being made for deferment of payment or for payment by instalments, as the particular circumstances might require.

    WINES AND SPIRITS (DUTY).
    Lieut.-Colonel MOOREasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer, within the period ended 31st March, 1932, the number of gallons of wine cleared from bond at the rate of 4s. duty?
    Major ELLIOT: The number for the year ended 31st March, 1932, was 2,641,000.
    Lieut.-Colonel MOOREasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that wine containing 40 per cent. alcohol can be cleared from bond at the rate of duty of 4s. per gallon when whisky of the same alcoholic strength must pay 29s. per gallon; and what are the grounds for this differentiation of duty?
    Major ELLIOT: With regard to the first part of the question, I am aware that the position described is true with respect to Empire wines. With regard to the second part, the reason is that wine and spirits are different beverages.
    Lieut.-Colonel MOOREasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the number of proof gallons of all kinds of spirits used in fortifying wines, foreign and Colonial, in bond which were cleared from bond during the year ended 31st March, 1932, at a duty not exceeding 4s. per bulk gallon; the amount of revenue which would have been paid to the Excise Commissioners if the spirits used in fortifying these wines had borne the usual rates of duty on spirits released
    1252
    from bond; and the number of gallons of wine at the 4s. rate of duty cleared from bond for the year ended 31st March, 1932?
    Major ELLIOT: With regard to the first and second parts of the question, I regret that the information is not available. The third part has already been answered in reply to a previous question by my hon. and gallant Friend.

  GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.

    STATISTICS.
    Sir W. DAVISONasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will give the House the comparable figures between 1913 and the latest available date of the total expenditure and the total numbers employed in each of the various Government Departments?
    Major ELLIOT: The expenditure of each Department is shown in the annual Appropriation Accounts. The figures for 1913–14 will be found in House of Commons Paper No. 98 of 1915. The latest figures available are those for the year 1930–31 recently published (House of Commons Paper No. 6 of 1932). As regards the number of staff employed in Government Departments, I would refer the hon. Member to the return given in Command Paper 3984 of 1931. Particulars of 1914 numbers will be found in pages 21 and 22 of the report of the Committee on Pay etc. of State Servants of 1923, of which I am sending him a copy. My hon. Friend will be able to make any desired comparison from these documents.
    Sir W. DAVISON: In view of the great importance of the House having the figures asked for in this question, and in view of the expense to which hon. Members would be put by getting statistical secretaries to obtain the information for themselves, does not my right hon. and gallant Friend think he could ask a member of the Department to secure the information asked for in the question in a tabulated form?
    Major ELLIOT: I fully sympathise with the desire of hon. and right hon. Members of this House to have full information on these and other subjects, but we are constantly being pressed by hon. Members to reduce the numbers of civil servants who are carried on the various

    1253
    Votes, and, unless we are able to omit these detailed answers, it will be absolutely impossible for us to make these reductions in staff.
    Sir W. DAVISON: Can my right hon. and gallant Friend say that there has been a reduction in this Department and that therefore the question might be withdrawn?
    Mr. CHARLES WILLIAMS: Would it not be quite simple to give these figures for, say, half-a-dozen departments, so that the public might know whether there had been a real increase in the number employed or not; and is it not a fact that it would not cost very much and that it would show to the public clearly where they were?
    Major ELLIOT: I am afraid that it would not. The half-dozen departments would always be subject to the charge that we were selecting the most favourable departments for our own case, and in the case of many of these departments the comparison between 1913 and the present time would not hold, since in the case, say, of the Ministry of Health it did not exist as such in 1913.
    Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Can the right hon. and gallant Gentleman say how many extra officials have been added as a result of imposing the Customs duties which hon. Members opposite supported?

    DAME MAUDE LAWRENCE.
    Mr. GROVESasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury why it is intended to extend the service of Dame Maude Lawrence beyond her 69th year; and whether such extension will be carried out merely by Treasury Minute?
    Major ELLIOT: Under Article 15 of the Order-in-Council of 10th January, 1910, an officer's employment, after reaching the age of 65, may be continued by tile Treasury, for a further period not exceeding five years, on being satisfied that retirement would be detrimental to the interests of the public service. The services of the Hon. Dame Maude Lawrence have been extended since April, 1929, by the Treasury under this Article. The question whether extension should continue beyond the age mentioned in the question does not arise for some time to come.
    Mr. HANNON: Is it not a fact that this distinguished lady civil servant has
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    rendered most valuable service to the Government during a long period of time?
    Major ELLIOT: Yes; that is the conviction of the Department.
    Mr. GROVES: I quite agree, but what will be the maximum age to which this lady can serve?
    Major ELLIOT: The age mentioned in the question certainly does not arise for some time to come—for years.
    Mr. GROVES: Does the right hon. and gallant Gentleman mean that this age is not correct, that she is not 69?
    Major ELLIOT: Certainly not now.
    Captain CROOKSHANK: Is it not rather unkind to give such publicity to a lady's age?

  LITHUANIA (MEMEL STATUTES).
  Mr. COCKS (for Mr. RHYS DAVIES)asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the Council of the League of Nations has made any recommendations with regard to the alleged infringement by Lithuania of the Memel Statute; and, if so, whether His Majesty's Government has made representations to Lithuania in accordance with such recommendations?
  Mr. EDEN: I would refer the hon. Member to the answer which I returned on the 24th of February last to a question by the hon. Member for West Bermondsey (Dr. Salter) on this subject. The points at issue between the signatory Powers and the Lithuanian Government, with regard to the interpretation of the Memel Statutes, have now been submitted for decision to the Permanent Court of International Justice by His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom, acting in conjunction with the Governments of France, Italy and Japan.

  SELECTION (STANDING COMMITTEES).

    STANDING COMMITTEE C.
    Mr. William Nicholson reported from the Committee of Selection; That they had discharged the following Members from Standing Committee C: Colonel Burton and Captain Knatchbull; and had appointed in substitution: Mr. Rankin and Major Renwick.
    Report to lie upon the Table.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  SUPPLY.
  [6TH ALLOTTED DAY.]
  Considered in Committee.
  [Captain BOURNE in the Chair.]

  SUPPLY.
    CIVIL ESTIMATES, 1932.
      CLASS IV.

        BOARD OF EDUCATION.
        Motion made, and Question proposed,
        "That a sum, not exceeding £26,892,676, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1933, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Board of Education, and of the various Establishments connected therewith, including sundry Grants-in-Aid."—[NOTE: £16,000,000 has been voted on account.]
        The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Sir Donald Maclean): When I first entered this House in 1906, the total of the Exchequer Estimates for that year was £149,500,000, and in the year 1914 it had risen to £197,500,000. The education Estimates in those two years were £12,652,548 and £14,660,311. To-day the Government are asking the Committee to give its approval to Estimates of £42,892,676, which compares with the Estimates last year of £48,362,677. With the sum raised from the rates by the local education authorities, there is a total of £86,000,000 for all educational purposes, in which I include grants to universities and some grants by the Department of Agriculture. If we include Scotland, very nearly £100,000,000 is raised from rates and taxes for the cause of education—more than half the total of the whole Budget of 1914. This is a colossal sum, and I assert with some pride that there is no other country in Europe that spends nearly as much.
        When the call for economy came last year, it fell to the Department over, which I had the fortune to preside to take its part. The May Committee recommended that there should be a total saving of over £11,000,000 in education, but this was based on a 20 per cent. reduction in teachers' salaries. Broadly speaking, teachers' salaries constitute about two-thirds of the total cost of edu-
        1260
        cation; for instance, taking elementary education alone, teachers' salaries amount to £40,000,000 out of the total of £62,000,000, and it is perfectly obvious that any alteration in the percentage must have important results on the amount of economy. The Committee will remember that the final cut was reduced to 10 per cent., and that is the principal reason why the proposed reduction of the Board's expenditure by the May Committee was roughly halved, the actual saving contemplated for the coming year being £5,466,701. If one excludes unemployment pay and the Road Fund, this is more than half the total reduction for the Civil Service Estimates in the year. In any year there must always be some inevitable new expenditure on general developments, such as school accommodation on new housing estates like Becontree, the reconditioning of schools, the elimination of blacklisted buildings, and so on, and the May Committee took the estimated addition at £2,250,000 and recommended that it should be reduced to £1,000,000. The Board have fully complied with that recommendation.
        I am sure the Committee will understand that such economies as these have been no welcome addition to the task either of the Minister or of the Department. In fact, it has been a difficult and a trying job, and I would like to express my thanks to the officers of my Department for all the help they have given to my colleague and to myself in undertaking this duty. Civil servants are impersonal and even more silent than the "silent Service." Ministers, on the other hand, have to take not only blame but occasionally praise, and I am sure the Committee will allow me to pay a special tribute to the Parliamentary Secretary of this Department, whose very remarkable industry and talents have been at our disposal in the task which we have undertaken. His assistance has been of the greatest value to myself and to the Department. The Postmaster-General, in the early days of these economies, gave me the great benefit of his genial companionship and valuable aid.
        Departments are often criticised, and I have taken my share in criticising their size and their expenditure from the opposite side of the House. It therefore affords me special satisfaction to let the

        1261
        Committee know that the Administrative and Inspecting Staff of the Board has been reduced in numbers since 1926 from 1,800 to 1,300, a 28 per cent. reduction, and the cost over the same period has fallen from £750,000 to £585,000, a reduction of 22 per cent. During that time, as I am sure hon. Members opposite will bear testimony, there has been no decrease in the general work of the Board, but rather, in some important Departments, a material increase.
        If hon. Members have looked at the Estimates they will see on page 6 that there has been a reduction in expenditure under every head from A to K, with two exceptions—the pensions of teachers and aids to students. Even the most acute critic of expenditure on education always, or nearly always, says, "We do not mind an increase in the expenditure if it goes towards those who are best fitted to make use of the education they receive," and to such a critic I am able to say that the increase of £4,483 for aids to students has gone in providing, in the main, scholarships to universities. I am sure the Committee will be delighted to know that the majority of these scholarships have been won from the secondary schools by boys and girls from the elementary schools who had in the first place gained scholarships in the secondary schools.
        The increase under the head of teachers' pensions is £350,000. There is nothing abnormal in that increase. Actuarial calculations made when the last Bill was before the House, in 1925—Members who take an interest in these matters will know that there were three Pension Acts, those of 1918, 1922 and 1925—foreshadowed it. It was estimated that in 25 years' time the cost would be over £9,000,000 a year, as compared with £6,000,000 today. On the other hand, the contributions of 5 per cent. from the teachers and 5 per cent. from the rates, each calculated on the salaries paid, will not materially alter; in fact, the probabilities are that those contributions will remain static. One reason for the heavy charge is the fact that teachers retiring now are, being pensioned on full service, although they only began to contribute under this scheme in 1922, and the rates only began to contribute in 1928. The Emmott Committee estimated the value of this gift as equivalent to an annuity of about £4,500,000 a year for 40 years. I am sure
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        that this heavy and increasing charge will not be begrudged. It was a step taken by this House, which, I am pretty sure, no Parliament is at all likely to go back upon. Further, it is perfectly clear that this will be regarded, as it is regarded to-day, as a first charge on the funds voted by Parliament for education.
        With regard to teachers' salaries I can do no other than repeat here the answer which I gave in September in this House when I said:
        "The reduction in teachers' salaries is occasioned by the national emergency, and is not to be regarded as the view of the Government of what should be proper rates of remuneration of teachers under less abnormal conditions. The position should be reviewed on its merits when the financial position of the country allows."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th September, 1931; col. 1006, Vol. 256.]
        I should be very much surprised if the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his statement to-morrow, will say anything which will justify me in making any other reply if that question is repeated to me on Wednesday next.
        With regard to unemployment I will, at the risk of wearying the Committee, repeat a statement which I made in this House on the 24th September last:
        "I have made very careful inquiry into the matter and, while I can give no pledge …, yet, as far as I have been able to ascertain, there is scarcely any calling connected with the State in which those who are at present leaving college have less reason to fear unemployment. It may come; I cannot say."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th September, 1931; col. 1915, Vol. 256.]
        That is still the position, and the latest information with regard to the 8,500 young teachers who came out of colleges last year shows that of this number only 743 were known to be unemployed on the 31st of December last year, and I have reason to believe that the number has been further decreased since. As for the future I do not care to prophesy, but steps have been taken to restrict the numbers in the training colleges by 1,000 as from August next.
        Speaking generally, the teaching profession in this country have taken these reductions in good spirit, and so have the education authorities in carrying out the necessary economies. Last January at a meeting which I addressed in London I referred to a very small body of teachers who threatened to dissociate themselves from the children's

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        play hours and recreation out of school hours, but that small body in no sense represented the feeling of the general body of teachers.
        As far as my investigations have gone, I have reason to assert with some confidence that the teaching profession in this country, which comes under the cognisance of the Board of Education, is not only as well, but better remunerated than teachers in any other country in Europe. I know that in some States of America teachers have been paid at a higher rate, but I doubt whether any British teachers would, under present conditions, wish to exchange their positions with their American contemporaries.
        I will now return to the effects of these economies. In the Board's Circular 1413, which was issued in the middle of the crisis on the 11th September last year and has stood the test as a remarkable conspectus of the future, I referred to the effect of these economies, and I stated that existing facilities should be generally maintained. I desire to bear testimony to the active and skilful way in which the local authorities have dealt with a situation of extreme gravity and difficulty. I am strongly of opinion that, as has been the experience of the business world, enforced economies need not lead to a corresponding loss of efficiency. If I thought that I was making myself responsible for a serious blow at education by these economies, I should not be standing at this Box to-day.
        4.0 p.m.
        I will now turn for a minute or two to the health services in which there has been or will be some increase of expenditure. I do not suppose that there is any measure of expenditure which anyone would be inclined to criticise so long as it is devoted to the development of the health of the children on reasonable and proper lines. Health is a fundamental necessity of sound education and of national well-being. It is perfectly hopeless to have the finest educational machinery in the world if you are trying to impart it to a poor, undeveloped child. That is only ordinary common sense. I have no doubt that the children who are leaving school to-day are healthier and fitter than those who left 20 years ago. On the other hand, it must be recognized
        1264
        that complaints are made of the physique of many young men by employers. I understand that the Army authorities are concerned at the physical condition of the recruits. Those complaints undoubtedly point to what is a very serious national problem, namely, the risk of physical deterioration during the period of adolescence after leaving school. That is a problem which is beyond the control of the school authorities. Many workers to-day are engaged in splendid voluntary efforts to tackle this danger, which confronts so many hundreds of thousands of our young fellow-citizens. I would mention in this connection boys' and girls' clubs, boy scouts, girl guides and the many other similar activities. On Friday last, when there was a very interesting Debate in Committee on the Estimates of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, the hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. Lovat-Fraser) referred to the gang instinct among boys, and suggested that this instinct should be organised more effectively for good than it is at present, rather than be allowed to dissipate itself in evil. I think I ought to let the Committee know that, in this connection, since 1924 there has been a very remarkable development of work among juvenile organisations to which I have already alluded, and to which the Board of Education Juvenile Organisation Committee has paid, and is paying, very special attention. There has been an increase of nearly 100 per cent. in the case of girls and over 50 per cent. in the case of boys who are brought within the ambit of these organisations, and taking only the largest half dozen of these organisations, there is a membership now of well over 1,500,000. The Committee I am sure would be glad if that number were doubled or trebled if that were possible, although, as it is, it is very welcome progress. In connection with the Board of Education Juvenile Organisation Committee, I wish to recognise the great help and the valuable services of the Noble Lady the former Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education.
        It is precisely in a time of national stress like this that this voluntary work is most needed, and I would not like to leave this part of the subject without referring to the very

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        generous financial assistance given by the Carnegie United Kingdom Trustees, especially in South Wales and the Tyneside, where such assistance is sorely needed. The trustees have devoted large sums of money—well over £20,000—already. My right hon. Friend Mr. Lees-Smith, when President of the Board of Education, assured the trustees of the most cordial sympathy of the Board, and all possible assistance and encouragement. That is being given to-day. The gap is at present, as far as possible, being filled up by voluntary helpers, and I wish to bear testimony to the fact that the stirring appeal of the Prince of Wales to the young of the country to come to the assistance of this kind of work has had very satisfactory and most useful results.
        In regard to this problem of the health of the adolescent, there is a point to which I might direct the attention of the Committee, and that is the recent report of the Royal Commission on Licensing. That committee was composed of persons of the most divergent opinions. They represented various interests, and produced, naturally, a number of recommendations, but on some things they were unanimous. If I may paraphrase the saying of Sheridan in "The Critic,"
        "When Royal Commissions agree, their unanimity is wonderful."
        They agreed, among other things, on one point, and that was the importance which they attached to suitable instruction in the schools of the country in regard to alcohol, and they asked that consideration should be given to it by the Board of Education, and the Board have endorsed it. The Committee will be aware that there are two publications—the Board's syllabus on "The Hygiene of Food and Drink" and "Suggestions for Health Education" and it is proposed, instead of issuing these separately, to combine them into one pamphlet for the future. I think it would be very much better that the whole of this question should be treated as a matter of hygiene, and as part of the instructions relating to health.
        On one other matter affecting the subject of health to which attention has been directed on many occasions, may I say a word? Recent experiments have shown the very great value of milk as an addition to children's diet. About 800,000
        1266
        children are now receiving a daily ration of milk for which they pay 1d. as compared with 350,000 two years ago, and 120,000, in addition, have had milk provided free by the local education authorities. That is a very gratifying development. It is undoubtedly due to the work of the voluntary organisation in connection with agriculture. May I suggest to my agricultural friends that they have organised, so to speak, a market for their milk at their very door, and that this has been a great advantage to the children and also to agriculture itself.
        A word or two about the future. If I had the time, it would be easy to develop the subject under three heads—quantity, quality and direction, but to-day I regard direction as the most important. Future progress is inevitably cramped by questions of economy, and we know that the best that can be said about the national finances at the present time is that the operation has been successful, but that a long period of convalescence is necessary before the patient can be regarded as having regained normal health and strength. But this enforced pause in the development of education, as far as finance is concerned, must not mean, and need not mean, stagnation. Assuming conditions were fairly normal financially, it would be no disservice to education or the nation if a period were taken for quiet review and consideration as to the lines upon which to work in the future. Conditions have changed all over the world with regard to education, as in regard to other things, and education must adapt itself to these new conditions which are imposed on us as a nation, as on other nations. Success in the industrial struggle, not only for supremacy but for the maintenance of our present position, unsatisfactory as it is, will go to the nation whose citizens are best equipped to deal with it, and it is perfectly obvious that preparation for a livelihood is by no means a bad preparation for life. Other countries think so, and they are shaping their educational systems accordingly. European countries such as France, Belgium, Germany, Denmark and Czechoslovakia are all hard at work, and harder than ever at work, in training their young people for the future, and craftsmanship and technical training are being given their full place from the most primary form of education up to and including the universities themselves.

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        There is no lack of reports and investigations to guide us in the immediate future. For instance, there is the very remarkable report on Salesmanship under the chairmanship of Sir Francis Goodenough, with which, I hope, my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary will take an opportunity of dealing, and also with kindred subjects, in his reply. There is also one of the most far-seeing and interesting reports I have read for many a long day—that of the committee on Conditions in South Wales presided over by my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones). Quite apart from those in South Wales, I would suggest to Members who take an interest, as I am sure all do, in the problems which confront distressed areas and education in those areas, to study that report. There is another rather important report which will shortly be published, namely, the report of the two inspectors of the Board—inspectors on the technical side of the Board—whom I sent to investigate what had been done in France and certain other countries in connection with technical training in the junior schools. It is very interesting to know that the further East they went in Europe the more intensive was the preparation for practical livelihood among the young, and the more skilful the equipment of the young for their place in industry.
        One day last week my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade referred to the large place which Czechoslovakia is already playing in the industrial life of the world, and my information goes to show that in that country, from the mountains down to the foothills, and in the larger urban centres in the plains, the most elaborate and successful training is being accomplished. I will give one instance. In Czechoslovakia, 170,000 young people who have left school are released by their employers for further training in their working time—not outside working time, but in their working time. On the population figures for England and Wales, in this country, if that practice were adopted, there would be 500,000 young people being trained in this way; at present there are fewer than 15,000. I would say, "Keep your eye on Czechoslovakia, and on the example that is be-
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        ing set there in connection with the intensive training of its young citizens for future industrial life in that country."
        I am well aware that none of these problems can be settled by any ex cathedra pronouncements from Whitehall. We can issue circulars and pamphlets, but, unless this work is undertaken by the local authorities themselves, and determined in the light of the particular conditions in different areas, and of the particular schools and industries, not much good will be accomplished. There is a great field here for enterprise, not only by this Board, but by local authorities, by the teaching profession of all ranks, from the elementary schools to the universities, and by every department of industry and commerce. In order that no time shall be lost in this most important matter, I am already arranging to meet the Advisory Committee of Local Education Authorities, which was set up last September, and which has already proved its value. I hope to meet them in the course of the next two or three weeks for consultation as to the best way to get this matter into active and beneficial operation.
        Now I have done. There have been two or three eloquent perorations from this Box during the past few days, but I have nothing of that kind to present to the Committee. I will only say that it is a coincidence that this Vote should precede the Budget of to-morrow. The Budgets of future Chancellors of the Exchequer will depend very largely indeed on the output which the educational system of this country gives of wealth producers—of those who create the wealth upon which taxes are levied. I hope and believe that, not only from a purely financial point of view, but from an international and an ethical standpoint, large as these Estimates are, and economically administered as I hope they will continue to be, this nation will never lose sight of the fact that these expenditures, wisely used, are the greatest and best investment that any nation could make through the whole range of its services, in order to produce, not only an educated, but an honourable and effective citizenship.
        Mr. MORGAN JONES: I beg to move to reduce the Vote by £100.

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        I feel sure that the Committee will desire me to express on their behalf, as I do most heartily on my own, our thanks to the right hon. Gentleman for having presented to us so lucid a statement of the activities of the Board of Education during the time that he has been in charge of that Department. I confess that the right hon. Gentleman did not give me any special cause for rejoicing, for, if he will allow me to say so, the opening remarks of his speech sounded very much like an apologia. He seemed to me to be at very great pains to assure his followers behind him that these figures reflected in the fullest possible degree the most patient and devoted attempt to realise what is called economy through the medium of the activities of the Board. He used a phrase which I was rather surprised to hear from him. He spoke, almost in doleful terms, of an inevitable, unavoidable new expenditure, as though new expenditure on the part of the Board of Education were something of which he need in some wise be ashamed. I have a better opinion of the right hon. Gentleman than that; I can only think that his new associations have corrupted him in some way. However, he had to present to us a statement which, frankly, from the point of view of my hon. Friends on this side of the Committee, is one which, we have no hesitation in saying at once, is far from encouraging to us. The right hon. Gentleman, quite rightly, expressed his thanks to the officers of his Department for their assistance in the course of his period of office, and, as one who had the great pleasure and privilege of being associated with those officers, I know that any tribute that he may pay them is in no wise undeserved, but, rather, is less than would be adequate to the case. When the right hon. Gentleman offered them his thanks for their services, I felt like offering them my sympathy on the presentation of this story.
        This afternoon's discussion of our Education Estimates takes place, as we all know, in circumstances which are very different from those which attended the similar discussions that we had last year. Our country particularly, and the world at large, has seen a very grave financial crisis, and, in response to the implications of that crisis for our own country, there has been a change of Government—I think for the worse—and an em-
        1270
        barkation upon a policy of what is called economy. With regard to this proposal for economy, the point of view of my hon. Friends on this side of the Committee is well known. Speaking for myself, I regarded, and still regard, the point of view adumbrated by the May Committee as being a challenge to the whole philosophy of the movement to which I belong, a philosophy which that movement has preached in season or out of season for something like 40 or 50 years; and, if for no other reason than that we regard social services as being in real fact a definite contribution to our national well-being, I should regard opposition to the proposals of the May Committee's report as being amply justified. When the right hon. Gentleman entered upon his office, he naturally did so on the assumption that he was prepared to cooperate in these proposals for economy, and I daresay he entered upon that task quite conscientiously; I do not question that in any way. But when he came to discuss in his Memorandum the attitude of his Board concerning educational economy, he did, as he has reminded us this afternoon, give certain clear and explicit assurances. He said:
        "The Board contemplate that existing facilities should be generally maintained. … Local authorities should, however, forthwith review their expenditure and consider what economies are possible consistent with the maintenance of this principle."
        That statement was made in the early days of his Governmental activities. Then, later, in January, speaking in Len-don, he made this observation:
        "As far as I am able at present to ascertain, there should be an increase of employment rather than unemployment during the coming winter. There can be no sliding back from the standard at which we have already arrived, and, in particular, no reversion to those huge classes which were the bane of educationists and the despair of every teacher."
        I cite these observations because they indicate, I think fairly, the attitude of mind which the right hon. Gentleman desired us to accept as being his own in approaching the task of educational administration in this country.
        4.30 p.m.
        May I make this other general observation? In embarking upon the principle of economy, it seems to me that special responsibilities devolved upon the Board. In the first place, they had to make sure, as they still have to do, that they would

        1271
        be able to curb the tendency which is always present in some parts and in some minds—the tendency to abuse economy; and, secondly, while the right hon. Gentleman had in view the introduction of some measure of economy, it seems to me that the responsibility remained with him to prevent that economy from in any way jeopardising the gradual development of educational opportunity in the land. What about this business of economy as we have seen it in operation in the country? It is a curious feature of certain types of political thought in this country that, whenever economy is spoken of, forthwith those particular minds turn automatically to education. It is the first Department that secures their attention. We have had experience of this before, in the days of the application of the Geddes Axe, as we sometimes called it. Many people in the community have rushed wildly to see what they could do in order, if I may so put it, to lop off branches from the educational tree. Indeed, there is reason to fear that economy becomes all too frequent an excuse for parsimony. In many areas it seems to become an opportunity for being simply mean. It is effected by depriving poor children of their copy books. When you are applying economy to education, as far as the Board of Education is concerned, you are applying it in the main to children of the poorer classes, because the children of the well-to-do either go to private schools or to what are called public schools, which are not public in any sense. The population of the elementary schools consists of the children of the poor and, if you are going to apply economy, let it always be remembered that, in applying it to the educational system as controlled by the right hon. Gentleman, you are applying it to those least able to look after themselves. The greater the poverty of the subject with whom you are dealing, the greater should be your care in the exercise of economy at their expense.
        I have done my best to follow the reports from week to week as I see them in the educational papers and the impression left on my mind gives me ground for the gravest apprehension. I know the right hon. Gentleman is in some little difficulty administratively in the
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        matter, because you cannot compel these local authorities to spend more. You cannot always compel them to spend less though it is easier to compel them to spend less than to spend more. But the power of compulsion is, I admit, to some degree limited. All the same, a perusal of this memorandum itself indicates the almost immediate effect of this economy campaign. The second table on page 20 shows that capital expenditure grew steadily from 1924–25 until 1930–31. Then, in the year 1931, we have a sub-division from the beginning of the financial year to the entry into office of the first National Government—it is not the same as this Government; the more it changes the more it is the same—and then from the beginning of the National Government to the end of December. We have, therefore, five months of the period of office of the Labour Government and three months of this Government's period of office last year. Look at the enormous drop in capital expenditure approved of under every head. Of course, if you must accept the proposition that you are to embark upon economy, it is no indictment of the right hon. Gentleman but, from the point of view of my argument at the moment, those last figures indicate the extraordinary fright that seems to have possessed the mind of educational administrators up and down the country.
        The record of the late Labour Government indicates that we really made definite preparations for development educationally. I know the Postmaster-General does not like this kind of thing, but then he never has done and, if we reduced this to the lowest possible figure, he would still be dissatisfied. The big figure that stands opposite our year of office is £9,186,000. We did our best to stimulate local authorities to go ahead with their building programme, raising the basis of grants in respect of all such operations contractually undertaken between 30th September, 1929, and 30th September, 1932, from 20 to 50 per cent. I make no apology whatever for it because, from our point of view, education is to be regarded as a national rather than a purely local service. On that basis no sort of apology is to be expected from us for raising the basis of grants. Details are given on pages 20 and 21 as to how that money was spent. There

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        were 191 new schools, 222 enlargements of existing schools, 215 rebuilding or alteration of existing schools, and 532 sites with or without buildings thereon, playing fields etc. The figures for 5th September to 31st December are indicative to no small degree of the measure of fright that possessed administrators of education in the early days after the economy campaign of last autumn.
        When we pass from the presentation of the picture by the central authority to an examination of it in more local areas, we find ground for the gravest uneasiness. I read, for instance, of discussions in certain county areas and I read of a leading member of the farming community making a terrific attack upon the educational service of the county when at the same time, probably, that very same gentleman has rejoiced in a really substantial measure of exemption—complete with the exception of the farmhouse building—from local rating. At the very time these people are shouting for economy, this very month, we have carried through the House a Bill which is to present to a section of the farming community almost a subsidy of £6,000,000 a year, and yet they demand a cutting down of expenditure on schools and what not. It is so easy to be economical at the expense of other people. In these rural areas the school buildings are, on the whole, rather less efficient—I am putting it mildly—than they are in urban areas. I dare say there are large numbers of buildings which, according to any ordinary or decent standard, would be adjudged to be almost unfit for the purpose of a school. They are certainly not up to our modern educational standard. If they are allowed to remain as they are now, and if the amenities of the urban schools are, as I am sure is the case, yearly being enhanced, the handicap imposed upon the rural child, great as it is now, will, I fear, be substantially greater in the years to come. Therefore, I would plead that some pressure should be brought to bear upon these rural areas to improve their school buildings.
        I am very interested, as I believe many others are, in the very influential campaign that has been conducted in the last four or five years for providing national playing fields. Is it not odd that many schools in the heart of the country have less playground accommodation
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        than many a school in a thickly populated urban area? Surely, that is a state of affairs which must receive attention, and I very much hope that the Board will keep its eye upon the point.
        Before we come to the playing fields, there is another elementary provision to which we ought to pay attention. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will not regard the matter as in any way a condemnation of his administration. It is not personal to his administration at all. It is something which has appertained to schools all too long, but as we grow older the conditions become more imperative in their insistence for attention. Take the question of the sanitary accommodation at those schools. Oftentimes there is no water available and no decent lavatory accommodation. On the other hand, children come for many miles to school under wet conditions, and they sit in their wet clothes all day long, and it is not surprising that oftentimes we find children from country areas whose health has been undermined at those very early ages. I therefore urge the right hon. Gentleman not to allow the principle of economy to exorcise altogether the spirit of educational development.
        While I am still dealing with the question of rural conditions, I should like to say a few words upon a matter which again is not pertinent to the particular administration of the right hon. Gentleman but rather a concomitant of the administration of every Government, namely, the question of fees in secondary schools in county areas. I was astonished some months before I left the Board of Education to see what very high fees were charged in some county areas in the country. I speak from memory now, but I recall a county, which shall be nameless, where the fees were as much as 14 guineas a year. Fourteen guineas for an agricultural labourer makes secondary education almost impossible—I should say wholly impossible. When we remember that the secondary schools in those areas are necessarily in some central market town and that children have to go some distance from their homes to the market town which involves the expense of travelling, or possibly even lodging, it clearly makes the whole business of entering a secondary school through the medium of fees wholly impossible for the children of less well-to-do parents. On the other hand, the number

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        of free places in those secondary schools is very far from adequate, and consequently a secondary education in those areas tends largely to be the preserve of the better-to-do people.
        I turn to urban areas, and I should like the right hon. Gentleman, or the Parliamentary Secretary, to let us know how the position stands in regard to certain areas. The extraordinary thing about the application of some of the proposals for economy is that they have been so blind and unreasoning in character that it is clear there has been no thought about them. There has been no working out of the application of the principle at all, but just simply cutting as though they were simply butchers. I will take the Salford district. There is a case where there was no semblance of reasoning but just merely an edict issued by some economy committee like that which the unjust steward issued to his servants in the parable, "Take thy bill and write down so and so." The result is that you have an infinite number of odd results accruing from a blind adherence to the fetish of economy. I should like to know from the Parliamentary Secretary where the Board stands in regard to authorities which take up an attitude something similar to that of the Salford Education Committee? And indeed, not the Salford Education Committee, for let me be fair to them. The education committee in Salford, I think, were wholly against the proposal of the economy committee who carried it in the teeth of the opposition of the education committee at the dictates of a sort of local Sir George May.
        I am interested personally in another case. What is the present position with regard to Bristol? Before we left office we were obliged to indicate to that authority that we were so displeased with the rate of progress, or with the fact that there was no progress, that we even had to indicate that we should have to withhold the grant. I do not know if my information is correct, but I read that the Bristol committee still remain unrepentant. I hope that it is not so. The right hon. Gentleman shakes his head. I am very glad to hear it. If there has been progress made so much the better, but I want to know where the progress has been, because it is not
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        enough merely to give us a little progress, say, in regard to the new housing sites. What about the schools inside the city itself? After all, the late Government took almost the only step which a Government could take in the matter by indicating that they were proposing to withhold the grant for a period of months. If the right hon. Gentleman or the Parliamentary Secretary can assure us that there has been a change in this matter, I shall be extremely glad. Not to go too far afield, what of our neighbours across the river, at the London County Council Hall? They are enthusiastic supporters of certain Governments, I believe, and I gather that just now they are putting themselves with full vim and vigour behind the chariot of economy. I shall be very glad to know the present position in regard to London.
        I turn to the question of secondary education, and I invite the Committee to look at page 17 of the Memorandum. I have already made a reference to fees in rural areas, and, if I had the time, I could dwell upon the table given at the bottom of the page indicating the fees which are still charged—I ascribe no fault to the right hon. Gentleman personally for it—in secondary schools up and down the land. When you remember that only 5.8 per cent. of the schools have no fees, 18.7 have fees not exceeding eight guineas, and so on all through the table, we see that the progress towards freeing secondary education from the incubus of "feedom" is still somewhat slow. I emphasise it, not because I expect any great change to take place during the period of economy, but because I wish to emphasise the point of view of my party. We visualise the time—I do not say that it will come immediately; it cannot come at a stroke perhaps—and I make no apology for saying it, when secondary education in this country will be as free as elementary education. Education, in our judgment, is not a privilege reserved for a few or handed to all, but rather a right to which all are entitled if the State is to expect from each child the full measure of service of which each child is capable.
        If the Committee will look at page 17—the first table—they will see that in regard to the non-fee paying pupils there has been a substantial increase in numbers in 1930 as compared with 1929, and that in

        1277
        1931 there was still a substantial increase of 37,000 free places. Of that I am not in the least degree ashamed. When we turn to the other column, the fee-paying pupils, and take those from the public elementary schools, we observe, comparing the figures of 1930 with the previous figures, that in regard to the number of children passing into the secondary schools by fee-paying we have almost slipped back to the condition of affairs in the year 1925. There has been a decline also, I must admit, in the number of fee-paying pupils who are not public elementary school children, but the figures, in regard to public elementary school children as well as non-elementary school children, reflect the straightened financial conditions in which the parents have recently found themselves. Poverty, clearly, is proving a bar to children whose parents would pay, if they could, whether they come from elementary schools or from non-elementary schools. I do not know that you can find a clearer indication of the effect of poverty interfering with the educational progress of a child than the figures to which I have just directed attention.
        Lastly, I notice that the right hon. Gentleman spoke at some length—and I am very glad that he did so—about the question of training college students. He will understand that we on this side of the Committee feel a little unhappy about the situation, because, while we were in office, we definitely stimulated and encouraged students to go to the colleges. We had in mind two educational proposals. One was the raising of the school leaving age Bill which never matured into legislation, and the other the question of re-organisation. There is no doubt, I think, that many of those young people went into the training colleges largely upon the assurance that there would be a job available for them when they emerged from the colleges in 1931 and 1932. The right hon. Gentleman said, in the statement I read to the House at the beginning of my speech, that from his point of view he saw no reason to anticipate unemployment. I hope that that is true. I think that he said that there are sill 743 unemployed.
        Sir D. MACLEAN: Rather less now.
        Mr. JONES: Shall we say 700? There are 700 still unemployed.
        Sir D. MACLEAN: I should say less than that number.
        5.0 p.m.
        Mr. JONES: I will take it that the number is less than that. My hon. Friends on this side are receiving representations, I am sorry to say, from a large number of parents whose sons and daughters have passed through the training colleges during the period under review, and are now unemployed. Moreover, I regret to say, no doubt owing to the mood of economy abroad in the country, large numbers of other young people who normally would go into the training colleges are not being allowed to enter them. It is a very serious state of affairs. I do not attribute any fault to the right hon. Gentleman in regard to those who are coming out of college—that was our job in 1929–30—but it is an important matter for the right hon. Gentleman that economy should be so carefully guided that as many of these young people as possible shall speedily find employment in schools, and that others who have not yet been to college shall be able to find places therein.
        I should like to put a few questions to the right hon. Gentleman. Am I right or am I wrong when I suggest that, very largely on account of this economy campaig, reorganisation is at a standstill? If that be true, then a very serious change has taken place in our educational development. The right hon. Gentleman knows that when the Hadow Committee's Report was presented to the country it was acclaimed by everybody as a piece of real educational statesmanship, and for two periods—while the Noble Lord the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy) was in office, followed by our administration—since the publication of the report, endeavours have been made by two successive Governments to implement as speedily as possible the general proposals of that report. I should like to know what is the present attitude of the Board of Education concerning reorganisation. A child goes through school only once. You may postpone if you like certain educational changes for two or three years, and that may be convenient, but in consequence of that postponement certain children passing through the schools can never regain the chance which they lose. However generous your intentions may be

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        concerning children in 1934 or 1935 the important point is, how are you dealing with those who are now passing through the schools and who will never again have a chance of returning to any form of educational instruction?
        I am sure—and with this I would couple the last point with which I wish to deal—that if hon. Members who normally look with suspicion upon educational effort would only realise the immense potentialities that lie within a well-considered scheme of reorganisation they would change their view concerning the contribution which education can make to our national wellbeing in the future. It is often urged against our education that we are only catering for children of one type of mind. I think that largely in regard to our secondary school system that has been true. Educational reorganisation would have given us a chance to make a decent start in catering for the child who so disastrously has been overlooked in the past, namely, the practical-minded child. If reorganisation is to be held up for three or four years more, then we really are going to delay a most important and an extremely necessary development and departure in our educational arrangements.
        The right hon. Gentleman very kindly made reference to a committee over which I had the honour of presiding when I was at the Board of Education—I am obliged to him for the reference—in which we inquired into the educational affairs of South Wales. There we were dealing with one-industry areas, where children grew up almost without any knowledge of the existence of other trades. So cribbed, cabined and circumscribed were their lives that the world outside their valleys was entirely terra incognita, unknown territory, to them. I am certain that tens of thousands of boys and girls in the mining areas in South Wales and elsewhere are condemned to a life of comparative futility and of economic waste from the point of view of the nation unless we can devise ways and means for reorganising the form of technical instruction presented to our children. We have done a great deal in regard to elementary education and we have done a great deal in regard to secondary education in the last 30 years. But technical education still remains the Cinderella of our education service. That will not do. We are
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        handicapping our youths and our maidens unjustly in the great race with the youths and maidens of other countries.
        The right hon. Gentleman has very wisely—I have not seen the report, but I anticipate seeing it and reading it with very great pleasure—sent two inspectors to visit a certain number of countries in Europe, from Czechoslovakia down to France, countries in the very heart of Europe. He has told us of the superlative efforts which are being made by those countries in order to meet the needs of the new world by equipping their young people technically. Looking upon the changes in our industrial system in this country since the War, can anyone doubt that technical equipment and technical education is long overdue here? For my part, if I see in any forthcoming Education Estimates presented by the Board signs of more ample financial provision for developing our technical education activities, I shall not be the last in expressing my hearty appreciation.
        I would like to suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that in dealing with technical education—I suggest it on account of my experience in the committee to which he referred—that we should try to induce the local education authorities not to study their technical education requirements in isolation. To do so is of no use. There are a number of education authorities in South Wales; I forget how many. What is the use of small Part III authorities trying to tinker about with technical education on their own? The thing simply cannot be done. The only effective and efficient way in which it can be done is on a regional basis, and I hope that the Board will encourage and exhort local education authorities to act in that spirit and in that direction.
        I apologise to the Committee for having delayed them already too long. I am sorry that I cannot speak enthusiastically about the story which the figures disclose. But if it will give my right hon. Friend any personal comfort, I will say that I believe his heart is better than his Estimates. I believe his intentions are far better than these figures have disclosed, and I have no doubt that if the financial condition of the country justified it in his view he would be happy to present a, better story than he has been obliged to present this

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        afternoon. I thank him very heartily for the way in which he has presented the Estimates and, although we cannot accept them as an adequate reflection of what might and what ought to be done educationally in this country to-day, I still say to my right hon. Friend that I am willing to believe that he is prepared to express repentance at some future date.
        Captain SPENCER: In rising to speak for the first time I am not ashamed to confess to some feeling of awe and trepidation, but I am encouraged by the recollection of the kind consideration which has been extended to those who have ventured to do the same thing before. Some years of experience in the training of teachers and in secondary schools have taught me that in connection with education it is very easy to fall into the peril of phrase-making, and equally easy to think that the more money that is spent, the more efficient the product is likely to be. It has also taught me that a policy of cheeseparing on the one hand or a policy of seesaw expenditure on the other is productive of very evil results. The Minister has told us this afternoon that he proposes to take this opportunity of taking stock of the educational position. I sincerely trust that he will use his time to the best advantage.
        One is forced to the conclusion that we have not yet decided, something like 14 years after the Fisher Act, upon any settled policy in connection with education. We have not yet decided where exactly our secondary school is to stand, or what part our junior technical schools, our senior schools and so forth are to play in the general scheme. In spite of that, we have made certain efforts in the past. We have built up, say, our jigsaw puzzle, but as soon as we have got it done someone has come along and upset the whole lot, and we have made a. tentative effort to start again in the same direction. I do hope that the Minister really intends at this juncture to get busy and to plan out some scheme which shall show the relative parts to be played by the different schools.
        I want to see our secondary schools and our technical schools brought much more directly into touch with industry. I was interested in an experiment made
        1282
        a few years ago to bring the Manchester High School of Commerce into touch with the trade and commerce of that city, and I was most disappointed to read one morning in a Manchester newspaper that the attempt had broken down. Reading between the lines I was forced to the conclusion that there has never been very much drive behind it, that it was more of a paper scheme than an actuality, but I should like the President of the Board to urge both sides, the educational side and the trading and industrial side, to come together and work together because it is only by so doing that trade and industry will reap the full benefit of what we are spending as a nation on education. There is no place, I think where reform is needed more than in our secondary schools, and may I be permitted to make one or two suggestions to the right hon. Gentleman. We have heard a great deal both in this House and outside of the joys of free education; how every child should be admitted to the secondary school without fee. I want to make one or two observations on that matter.
        In the first place, I should like to ask the Minister whether he cannot introduce a little more of that blessed elasticity, of which we have heard such a great deal in connection with various Bills brought before this House during the last few months. One of the greatest virtues of those Bills has always been that they were very elastic, and I should like the President of the Board of Education to make the entrance age of 11 years a little more elastic than it is at present. Some authorities I believe, like the London County Council, make arrangements by which a child over the age of 11 years can be admitted to a secondary school. My experience in the North of England is that unless a child can pass from the elementary school to the secondary school at the age of 11 its chance is gone for ever, and it will have no subsequent opportunity of getting into a secondary school except via what used to be called the central school. I should like the President to do something for that child. I also put in a plea for the dull child in connection with secondary education. Schooling and education are not synonymous terms. That is a fallacy into which we are very apt to drift. We

        1283
        think that the more schooling you can give the better educated the child is and that the more schooling you give the more desirable citizens they are. I suggest that very often the most desirable members of the community are not the most learned and that the most learned are not always the most desirable. That is the case very often in our school life. I know of scores of instances of children who, through this absurd entrance test, have been debarred from moving into secondary schools who by their temper and attainments and their character and influence, would be worth a thousand children who may be able to tell you how soon it will take to empty a bath if both taps are left running.
        May I refer to the other magic age, the age of 16. Secondary school children finish their education, as we call it, at the age of 16 and take the school-leaving certificate examination; or most of them do so. I think about 75,000 of them do so every year. I am going to ask the President of the Board, even if it means setting up another committee, to do something to alter the nature of this test which brands a child for the rest of its life. At the present moment the test for a school-leaving certificate examination is identical with the matriculation examination, which should never be the case because it has nothing to do with it. The matriculation examination is a test to enable a child to pass to a university, and of the children who now take that examination only 10 per cent. pass on to a university while 90 per cent. do not. They are compelled to take this matriculation examination and if they pass well are given a certificate that they have matriculated, but if they do not pass so well they are given the school-leaving certificate. In that examination, in my modest opinion, far too much stress is laid upon the purely academic side. A child must be able to recognise certain passages of poetry, a little piece taken from a huge chunk of poems, and must be able to say where it comes from, write notes upon it and explain it. This test is applied to other subjects as well. By that sort of instruction you are simply cramming a child with facts, whereas the child who can make things, who can paint and draw and do something practical, is really out
        1284
        of the race altogether from the beginning because he is heavily handicapped in competition with the other child. I want to appeal to the Minister to try and make this school-leaving certificate what it really is, a warranty, a guarantee of the child's attainments, what the child actually has done during the whole of its school career, something he can show his employer, and not merely the result of perhaps two or three months' hectic cramming to be followed by a feverish week of examinations with perhaps three or four years' slackness beforehand.
        I hope that the speech which the President has made is not related in any way to his fiscal views. I am rather suspicious. I remember that those who held the same fiscal views in the last century as the right hon. Gentleman holds now were in favour of child labour, of half-timers, and the exploitation of girls and children in our factories. I hope that in his zeal for the shades of a century ago the right hon. Gentleman will not allow his enthusiasm to extend to the educational field. The Education Estimates are cut to the bone. The right hon. Gentleman did not say that; although his three colleagues at the head of the Services took the trouble to impress that point upon us. I think the Education Estimates are cut to the bone, and I appeal to hon. Members of the same party as myself that it shall not go forth to the nation from this House, or by any misinterpretation to which we may be subject, that the party to which we belong is a foe of education. I am aware that there are a few Members of my party who think that education breeds Bolshevism, unrest and upheaval. Far from it. If you look at the history of modern times you will find that it is where education has been the privilege of the few and denied to the many that the greatest upheavals have taken place, and not the least of the influences which have kept this country on an even keel has been the education which we have spread over a wider area than has been the case in those countries which are sinking to decay.
        Sir PERCY HARRIS: It is with great pleasure that I have to congratulate the hon. and gallant Member for St. Helens (Captain Spencer) on his maiden speech. It is difficult to

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        believe that it is a maiden speech, and if I had not an assurance of that fact I should have thought that he had gained his first experience in this House many months ago. I also want to congratulate him on the whole tone and temper of his address. It shows a remarkable practical knowledge of the big business of education, obviously, learnt in school. I welcome his clarion call to the Conservative party. As far as I am able to speak for my Liberal colleagues on these benches I may say that he was not preaching to deaf ears. Every word of his eloquent peroration we endorse. Education is cut to the bone, and I have a shrewd suspicion that in his heart of hearts the President of the Board of Education thinks the same. Whether he is allowed to say so is another story. His task now unfortunately is to put on the brake. I want to deal with the speech of the right hon. Gentleman. No-one who listened to him could fail to be attracted by his personal charm. He conveyed the impression of being full of human sympathy, but he had a. very hard and difficult task as the President of the Board of Education, and one felt that we were not listening to the President of the Board of Education but to the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, whose main business it is to guard the public purse.
        5.30 p.m.
        Let me refer to the delicate and difficult problem of salaries. It is a real and living problem, and we cannot avoid it. It is no use apportioning blame, there it is, and I was hoping that my right hon. Friend would have been able to send out a message of hope and encouragement to the great teaching profession. After all, the success of our education depends upon them. You may give them good buildings, excellent appliances and the best organisation, but if the teachers are discontented and are under any grievance inevitably the children suffer. The May Report showed a complete misunderstanding of the business of education. I have a shrewd suspicion that they did not trouble to take evidence and that they were guided too much by mere figures. I am the last to under-estimate the financial stringency of the country. I do not think we are yet out of the wood. The world blizzard is still shivering every country in Europe and it must be reflected in our trade and finance. At the same time I think we should take a true
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        perspective in this matter. A sum of £64,000,000 for Elementary education is a big figure, a big burden on the nation; but let us realise what is done out of that sum. You are dealing with an army of no less than 5,000,000 children, taught and trained, their health attended to and buildings and playgrounds provided for them. It requires as officers, if one may use military parlance, 170,000 teachers, and they are now getting what some think the princely sum of £224 a year for their job. That is an average figure. In those 170,000 officers there have to be included 30,000 commanding-officers or head-teachers. Those figures give an entirely different perspective to the cost of education, and I am sure I have the Committee with me when I say that if education is worth doing it is worth doing well. A cheap and nasty education is money wasted. More and more we are realising that 20 or 30 years ago most of our educational effort was wasted, because of insanitary buildings or unqualified, untrained and inexperienced teachers. One of the great advances of the last 30 years has been the toning up of the whole teaching profession and the drawing into it of a better type of men and women with ambition and character, properly trained, not only in training colleges, but, as we want in the future, in the universities.
        Nothing would be worse than that a message should go from Parliament, as was suggested in the May report, that the business of the teacher was work in which any ordinary person could engage. Not only is teaching a profession, but it is a vocation, and for its success needs the highest attributes and qualities. It needs the missionary spirit. It needs that a person shall give of his best, if he is to do good for the children under his care. Therefore, I say to the Parliamentary Secretary, that when he replies he should give some encouragement, some stimulus if you like, to the profession. He should make it clear that this is merely a temporary expedient to meet an economic crisis, and that as soon as things have come right, or even earlier, the teachers will be one of the first sections of society to be considered and to be generously treated by the State. That is especially important, because I hear comparisons with the unemployed

        1287
        going on. Do not forget that the teachers were in a special position. They had a distinct contract with the State and the local authorities. That contract was brought about as the result of long negotiations by a committee especially set up by the Board of Education. I am the last person to want the mind of this Committee to be diverted from the big problem of education by this unfortunate controversy. I would only say that all your effort at reorganisation and at new buildings will be largely wasted if you have not, first and foremost, the cooperation of the teachers.
        May I make one reference to the alteration in the grant formula; the Minister did not make much reference to it. The hon. Lady the Member for East Islington (Miss Cazalet) has been for several years on an education committee, and she is far better qualified to talk on the grant formula than I am, so that I am not going to say very much about it. Speaking to a prominent official last week, I said that I was going to refer to-day to the grant formula. "For God's sake don't try to explain it to the House of Commons," he replied, "there are very few people who understand it, and those who do find it impossible to explain it to the others." I am not going to try to do that. I would point out that under the grant formula a place like London is very much the loser, and has to find, even when economies and additional burdens are reckoned, something like £350,000 out of the rates. They have to make economies in every direction, in books, apparatus, painting, cleaning and repairs. I do not think there is any serious loss this year as the result of these economies, but if they have to be repeated next year, they will mean a serious loss in educational efficiency.
        That is the thing the Minister will have to face. He will have to realise that if this economy stunt—although I do not want to use the word and I would rather say "policy"—is to go on for another 18 months, it must be at the expense of educational efficiency and at the expense of the children. The right hon. Gentleman did not refer much to reorganisation, but the hon. Gentleman opposite made a very ample reference to the whole policy of reorganisation. He suggested that reorganisation as the result of the new
        1288
        policy had been curtailed, stopped or abandoned. To my personal knowledge that is not so. Reorganisation is going on. The policy initiated by the Noble Lord the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy) when he was President of the Board is still being pursued, or the serious part of it, I think I may say throughout the country. The utility of reorganisation is rather frustrated by these economies, such as they are.
        The Committee will remember that the idea of the Hadow Committee was that there was to be a change in the schooling of children. They were to be transferred to a new environment, either to a new building or to some senior classes. I will quote a sentence from the report bearing upon that:
        "We desire to mark as clearly as possible the fact that, at the age of 11, children are beginning a fresh phase in their education which is different from the primary or preparatory phase, with methods, standards, objectives and traditions of its own."
        Then there is another paragraph in which they say that many of the children feel ill at ease in an atmosphere of books and lessons and are eager to turn to some form of practical and constructive work. Anybody who has been in the schools and in contact with education, as I have for the last 25 years, can bear out the wisdom of that policy. It is no use having a mere paper change, a mere shifting of a block of children from this building to that building. You need a change in equipment. I very much agreed with the hon. and gallant Member for St. Helens when he referred to the so-called dull child. That is a complete misnomer, because the child is so often one that will express itself with its hands through crafts, through the paint brush or through any of the applied crafts that have been carried on in our central schools so successfully in the last few years. That work cannot be carried on without equipment. It is no use asking the teacher to change his habits to give children opportunities for craft-learning as opposed to book-learning without the proper tools and equipment being available.
        What is happening? Undoubtedly—and I think the right hon. Gentleman should realise this—everywhere throughout the country, as a result of this financial crisis, there have been little economies that have invariably meant

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        the cutting down of the equipment of the schools. I have a whole list of authorities who have abandoned their woodwork or metalwork centres or laboratories, because of the difficulty of the provision of the necessary appliances. The same thing is going on in the rural districts. I have an example in the county of Gloucester, where three months' notice has been given to the instructor in agriculture. At a time when there is going to be a great agricultural revival, and when we have spent £6,000,000 on stimulating production by agriculture in order to give employment, the county of Gloucester thinks fit to give three months' notice, not because of inefficiency, but on the grounds of economy, to its agricultural assistant instructor. That is spoiling the ship for a pennyworth of tar. That is really being penny wise, pound foolish.
        I want the right bon. Gentleman, as President of the Board, to stop these mere petty economies and not to allow our agricultural labourers to be starved and stinted of their opportunities for education over small economies of that kind. That is the kind of spirit we do not want to see among our local authorities, and I would like the Board to stop it. I was very much impressed by the right hon. Gentleman's reference to foreign countries. For the last few years I have been trying to persuade the Minister to explore what was being done abroad, but I have had but little encouragement. Now a Liberal Minister has listened to this suggestion and has at last sent two of his inspectors abroad. I am sure we have much to learn. A reference Las been made to Czechoslovakia. He might have sent his inspectors to Germany; I do not know whether he did. In these times of financial depression, in Germany there has been no serious stinting in education. I remember, when I was in Germany five years ago, speaking to one of the burgermeisters, I think it was the oberbürgermeister of Nuremberg. I said to him: "How can you afford all this expenditure on education, these new buildings, new organisations, and new equipment in your technical schools? You are supposed to be going through a great financial crisis." The answer I got was: "When, under the Dawes Plan, we had to pay reparations, we realised that
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        we could only pay reparations by developing the intellectual equipment of our nation."
        We, too, can weather the storm here, and come through our economic crisis, only by taking this opportunity for the youth of our country. Revival must come sooner or later. Some hon. Members think it is going to come because of tariffs. We are going to have new industries. The President of the Board of Trade waxed eloquent last week on a great industrial revival, with new factories. I suppose that if factories are to be a success they must be manned. It is very significant that the President of the Board of Trade had to admit that the men who were starting these factories were foreigners who had the necessary training, scientific and technical, to enable them to do the work. Many of these new industries are of a highly technical character. If they are to last, both employers and employés must have the advantage of scientific and technical education.
        In the last Parliament we had a proposal for raising the school-leaving age which caused a good deal of controversy. The right hon. Gentleman, I know, is in favour of the principle; indeed, I think he was the first to move a Resolution in favour of that principle, a fact which is to his credit. Now the possibility of raising the school age seems as remote as the Greek Kalends. [An HON. MEMBER: "Hear, hear!"] Yes, an hon. Member says, "Hear, hear," and we know that in the present financial position of the country the possibility of raising the school age seems very remote. It does not sound like practical politics but the right hon. Gentleman does not say that we are to sit still and do nothing, or that we are to imagine that the last word has been said in education policy. On the contrary, we have a great responsibility. The right hon. Gentleman referred to Czechoslovakia. In that country every boy and girl in working hours, in the employers' time, has to go through some form of continuation school and the same thing goes on throughout Germany. There, the Children are getting an opportunity which is, I will not say denied to our children, but which is certainly not taken advantage of in this country. It is true that many of our

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        children could go to such classes, if parents or employers insisted, but the opportunity, as I say, is not taken advantage of by the greater number of our young people in industry. Nothing of this kind can be done without some form of compulsion.
        We know that the Act of 1918, the great charter of education for which Mr. Fisher was responsible, made full provision, as an alternative to raising the school age, for some form of compulsory continuation school. I am not sure that it is not the better policy. There is much to be said for it. We made the experiment in London in 1921 and, educationally, it was a complete success, but it had to be dropped because of the then financial difficulty, and because outside local authorities did not co-operate by doing the same thing. The right hon. Gentleman during the next few months ought to put on his thinking cap and try to work out some policy, with his Board, which will provide for the continued education of the great army of children—the vast majority of children indeed—who leave school at the age of 14. Less and less is there a demand in industry for unskilled men and women. More and more are young persons losing situations at the ages of 16 or 17—those who have left school at 14 and have finished their education on the lower standards in the elementary schools. A very interesting report reached me to-day from the Committee on Juvenile Employment in London to which the right hon. Gentleman referred. The report mentions the experiment now being carried out by the Ministry of Labour in providing training centres for unemployed young people under 18 years of age.
        There are about six of these centres in London and I happen to be familiar with them. There is one at Hammersmith, one at Bethnal Green, and another at Battersea, and at such centres one may see those who are more or less the failures among juvenile workers, that is to say those who have lost their situations at the ages of 16, 17 or 18, as opposed to those who have remained in jobs. These young people, at first, came unwillingly to these education centres. I remember visiting a centre in the early days of the experiment and the head of the institution told me that he had had to face something like a not in which
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        desks were destroyed and windows broken and he was very uncertain about the success of the experiment. But, after 18 months, the experiment has proved a complete success. These lads who have been in blind-alley employments, who have been van-boys, messengers, lift-boys, hotel pages and so forth, find themselves at 16 or 17 thrown on the labour market. When they go into these centres almost invariably great talent or skill can be discovered among them. Very often these boys instead of growing up to be charges on the State develop some talent or skill in some craft, and become potentially good citizens and useful producers.
        If that can be done with the derelicts and the failures what could be done with those who remain in employment, if they were given the opportunity to attend, or compelled by the State to attend during working hours at similar centres. The right hon. Gentleman has a great opportunity. He holds a big office, behind which there is a fine tradition. It is a bold thing to say but I venture the statement that the biggest Education Ministers have belonged to the party to which I belong—Mr. Foster and Mr. Fisher. I want the right hon. Gentleman to take his place with them. He has a far more difficult task than they had. He has taken office under an Economy Act and at a period of trade depression and financial stringency, but, with his heart in his work, and with a desire to achieve, he may yet take his place with his two distinguished Liberal predecessors as a great Education Minister.
        Mr. PRICE: I rise to join in this discussion with the feeling that we are now dealing with what is probably the most important question which has been before us since I became a Member of Parliament. I wish to enter my protest against the suggested reduction indicated by these Estimates on the education services of the country. I have compared the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Minister to-day with the speeches made by those Ministers who presented the Estimates for the fighting services and, as the representative of a working-class constituency in the North of England, I enter my strongest protest when I see this Committee ready to pass—in some quarters even glorying in passing—Estimates for the fighting services which represent a reduction of less than £1,000,000,

        1293
        while prepared to agree to a reduction of nearly £6,000,000 on the education services.
        I think the Minister himself was very uneasy when he made his review of the situation in presenting these Estimates. He said that if he thought the Estimates he was putting before the Committee would impair the efficiency of education he would not be standing at that Box. But does the right hon. Gentleman seriously suggest that these Estimates can go forward without impairing education and elementary education in particular, even as we know it? [An HON. MEMBER: "They should do."] If either the Minister or the hon. Member who has just interrupted imagines for a moment that the policy behind these Estimates can be carried out without injuring the education of our children in elementary and secondary schools they are certainly mistaken. Not only are we faced with a proposed reduction of nearly £6,000,000 in the national provision for education, but in nearly every instance, all through the country, the authorities who administer education, acting on the circulars which have been sent out by the National Government, are curtailing and, after they know what has happened here to-day, will probably seek further to curtail expenditure on educational services in every branch that is within their administration.
        I came to the House of Commons as a collier, as a man who has not enjoyed the privilege or the facilities of a very wide education. I feel the lack of education and I am exceedingly anxious to see that the education services of the country should not go backwards but should at the very least be maintained at their present standard. Even in face of the great majority supporting this National Government I am not prepared to accept the statement that the financial position of this country is such as to call for further economies in our education services. I am alarmed at what is taking place in some parts of the country as a result of the National Government policy. In the West Riding of Yorkshire from which I come we have to face, not only the reductions in education services suggested by the Minister, but other reductions. On top of the 10 per cent. cut already made in those services a further £1,000 reduction is proposed by placing
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        in the schools teachers of a lower grade in substitution for teachers on higher scales. It is also proposed, to decrease the staff to the tune of £4,000 in this year's Estimates. By the replacement of teachers of higher grades the estimates in the West Riding are being reduced by £16,000, and the net result of these proposals is, on the elementary education estimates of this year, a proposed reduction of £21,000.
        6.0 p.m.
        These economies are being made in face of the fact that, at the moment, without any reduction in staff, we have 1,560 classes in the West Riding with More than 60 children in each class and 690 classes with over 60 children in each class. I suggest to the hon. and gallant Member for St. Helens (Captain Spencer), who made such a fine maiden speech, that with classes of that size it is impossible for the teacher to give the children that attention which is necessary if those children are to receive a reasonable education. Yet it is proposed to reduce the staffs, and consequently the efficiency, even of schools which were already working with these large classes. When we come to secondary and higher education we find even worse reductions suggested. A 17 per cent. cut is proposed on the grants given to the two principal universities in the county. The number of county minor scholarships has been reduced to 511 and the number of bursar scholarships has been reduced from 450 to 350—a very severe reduction. In continuation scholarships there is also a reduction of 100 and, the county major scholarships have been reduced from 58 to 45. These are scholarships on which, working-class pupils have to depend for their chance of getting higher education. One of the most serious things that has happened is that there has been in operation in that part of the country a scheme whereby a boy or girl, after passing their matriculation examination, could get help, according to the circumstances of the parent, to go on to a university or college. These grants have been in operation for years; but as a result of the economies very largely suggested from the Minister of Education and this Government, these grants are entirely cut off, and no child in any secondary school in the West Riding of Yorkshire will get any financial help in going forward to a university or college this year. And this is

        1295
        under an education authority that has been looked upon for years past as a very advanced authority. In our secondary schools in that part of the country we have hundreds of children, turned the age of 16, who will sit and matriculate and get their school certificates this July, children whose parents have made great sacrifices to keep them at school since they have have been 10 or 11 years of age, under a definite promise that when the time arrived that they were fitted to go forward to the universities or colleges, as the county handbook told them plainly, some grant would be made to take them there. This is now entirely cut out, and there will be hundreds of those children who are qualified in our secondary schools this year in that part of the country, who will be able to go no farther, owing to the fact that these economies have been put into operation.
        In his speech this afternoon the Minister of Education eulogised foreign countries on their advancement in both technical and physical education, and yet in the West Riding we find that, as a result of his own activities—he did for a time give some consideration and some grants for physical training to juvenile organisations in Yorkshire—these economies are going to stop there, and from henceforth they will get no grants from the education committee in that part of the country. I suggest that that policy is very largely being operated by all the education committees of the country, owing to these economy cuts, and I wish to make my protest in this House against a Government which will agree to continue spending £104,000,000 a year, without complaint, on the building-up and fostering of our fighting forces, and yet come forward with a reduction of nearly £6,000,000 for our educational services.
        We are dealing here with the inheritance and birthright of every child, and it is one of the last services on which this country ought to endeavour to economise. We should give to these children the fullest and best possible education, and make for them a free road to the universities and colleges. I want to remind the Committee that God, in His wisdom, has not ordained that the aristocracy of the country should be blessed with all the brains. In the humblest homes of this country, given a
        1296
        real opportunity, we have genius and ability, and the present Government are endeavouring to stultify the very genius which has been sent and which would improve civilisation, given an opportunity of a real, open, liberal education.
        I endeavoured to think kindly of the right hon. Gentleman while he was making his speech, but if ever I listened to a man who was speaking through his teeth and making a speech that did not come from his heart, it was the Minister of Education this afternoon, and I want to plead with him to go back to his Cabinet colleagues and do all that he possibly can to restore all the cuts that have taken place in education, including salaries. The Home Secretary, when he was dealing with juvenile crime on Friday last, emphasised the fact that during the War, when teachers were called to do service, the children suffered, and it is the children of that age that we are finding have suffered much, owing to the lack of educational facilities and of the guidance of good qualified teachers that they missed during the War.
        I want us to realise that in the teaching profession of recent years we have brought in some of the best characters in the British Isles, and that there is no greater impression on a child than the characteristics of its teacher. It is their teachers to whom they look up, and I am hoping we shall not impair the coming into that profession of the best men and women of the country. We cannot look upon it as a profession that anybody can practise. It is not true, as some Conservatives say—and the hon. and gallant Member for St. Helens, who made his maiden speech, admitted that they do so—that anybody can teach children. You have to have well-trained, well-equipped people, specially prepared for it. Therefore, I plead with the Minister to do his best with his colleagues in the Cabinet, as early as he can, to restore these cuts and to open the gates of education once more, as they were before the National Government took office.
        Mr. MORGAN: In addressing the House for the first time, I should like to crave that indulgence which the House so generously bestows and to ask for a large measure of patience. As one who is interested in the educational problems

        1297
        of this country, I should like to say that, in considering the Estimates before the Committee, we have to see whether we are really reconciling efficiency with economy, and I find that there are two major economies in the Estimates. One is the economy effected on teachers' salaries, which amounts to nearly £4,000,000, but I do not wish to dwell upon that. I think that I interpret the Minister of Education aright when I say that he looks upon that 10 per cent., and that we Members on the Government side look upon it, as a sort of bargain between the Government and the teaching profession, and I refuse to believe that either side will refuse to honour its bargain.
        As far as the teachers are concerned, I should say that they themselves, although they may disagree as to the psychological moment when the bargain should be made good by them, do not doubt for a moment that when that time does come the Government will keep faith with the teachers. Some of my hon. Friends think the teachers have been rather precipitate and over-eager in their demand for restoration of the cut, but I can only ask those hon. Friends to temper their judgment by remembering the attitude of the teachers during the Great War, when those teachers were receiving something like an average salary of 36s. a week. During that time they refrained absolutely from making an appeal for an increase in salaries, and later this House, without solicitation of any kind whatever, made a grant of £6,000,000 to meet their distress. I think we can rely upon them to adopt a similar attitude in these stringent times of economy.
        I rather want to dwell, however, on the second great economy, that is, the economy made by withdrawing the 50 per cent. grant, and I feel that in this we have a very questionable economy. Somebody has asked how the reorganisation schemes are progressing throughout the country. I believe the answer is that in many of the more progressive towns these schemes have been completed, that in other parts of the country they are in a sort of half-way stage, and that in still other unfortunate parts of the country the schemes have not even been attempted. That is, I take it, the present position, but at a time when we are all
        1298
        talking about reviving the agricultural districts, I will make the major part of my plea to-day to the Minister of Education that he should give his best attention, and that of his Department, to the exceptional difficulties of the rural schools—I mean the English rural schools.
        These schools are one of the institutions of which we as a nation are exceedingly proud. There is no more democratic institution than the English rural school. You find, in the earliest stages of education at any rate, labourers' children, farmers' children, and the children of professional men, all congregated in those schools, and I see at the present time a very real danger with regard to those schools. The difficulty is that they are naturally small and that the cost of adequately staffing them is necessarily high. It is easier to reorganise in the urban districts than in the country districts, and so, when the economic blizzard, of which an hon. Member spoke just now, came along in August last, many of these rural schools found themselves in a state of very imcomplete re-organisation.
        I suggest to the Minister that he should get some financial and other assistance for these rural areas. Two years ago, when the same problem presented itself in Wales, a Commission was appointed to deal with the question there, and they recommended grants-in-aid. In Scotland, I believe I am right in saying, such aid is automatically forthcoming to the more thinly populated districts, and I suggest to the Minister that it would be a good thing to do this for the rural districts in England. It would remove a gross anomaly. I refer to the lower payment of teachers in rural areas. If there is any teacher who earns his corn, if I may put it in that way, it is the teacher in the rural area, the teacher who is the leader and forefront of so many communal activities for good, and I should like to see the Minister take some steps, if it can possibly be done in these days, to see that these teachers are compensated in the way that I have suggested.
        That is the difficulty with regard to elementary schools, and the same difficulty arises with rural secondary schools. That is a more difficult problem, but it arises from very much the same causes, that is to say, the smallness of

        1299
        the school unit and the requisite cost. It would be wise for the State to take some definite steps to see if secondary education could be established in our rural districts on a sounder basis and in a more easily accessible form. In most of the country districts there axe a large number of small grammar schools, and we have had to rely on the testamentary benefactions of the past to run these schools, but we can no longer rely on these to-day, and we must find other means. I hope that our county authorities will carefully survey their areas so that they can make good the provision of secondary schools in the rural districts. I admit that much has been done, but much more might be done. In Scotland more has been done than in this country. Although as a party we stand for economy, we desire also that there shall be efficiency in this direction. Economy is only defensible when it does not strike at the foundations of our national health, our national strength and our national efficiency, and it would be a real danger if certain small schools were wiped out because they were uneconomical to manage. I was reading in the newspaper on Thursday about the threatened extermination or shutting down of the Perins Grammar School in Hampshire. That is a school of long standing, and I can only hope that the county authority have thought again or that the Minister of Education has been able to step in and advise them to spare the building. There is a real danger that we shall lose a large number of good points in the secondary school system unless assistance is forthcoming.
        I might be asked where we can effect economies in other directions than those indicated in the Estimates. I suggest that the Board should look for a wider administrative unit. In many of the districts there is gross overlapping of education authorities, with their consequent staffs. There seems to be a tendency on the part of certain education authorities to indulge in unnecessary officials. To take an example. I was looking through some estimates the other day, and I noticed provision for what are known as six registration inspectors. I have had considerable experience in schools, but I do not know what a registration inspector is. If he is, as I think
        1300
        he is, merely a person who goes round to see whether a certificated trained teacher is able to put in the register a stroke to mean "present" and a nought to mean "absent," that is a gross waste of time and money. Another way in which expenditure might be saved is in a more careful survey of the new schools that are being built. I notice a great differentiation of costs of similar types of schools in various parts of the country. Local charges would not account for the great difference. It is really due to the fact that one authority seems to compete with another in order to make more ornate buildings than its neighbour. That is one of the directions in which costs could be reduced. When people talk about the extraordinary cost of education, I might remind them that there is something which is far more costly than education, as was pointed out by the late Mr. Gladstone, that is, national ignorance.
        If the huge amounts that are spent are carefully analysed, it will be found that education is not the sole cost by a long way. Excellent institutions have sprung up round education, like the medical services and the feeding of necessitous children. These are all splendid things in their way, but allowing even for them, if we got what we ought to get from education, if we are inculcating the fundamental loyalties in our schools among our young citizens, we are spending wisely. One of the things which I fear to-day is that many of our county authorities are suffering from what I would call an impartiality complex. If they desire to be strictly impartial and not to be laid open to the charge of sectarianism, very little religion is taught in the higher branches of education—in our universities and in our higher secondary schools. Again, in their endeavours to be impartial, there is no emphasis placed on the teaching of patriotism in the schools; for fear of being charged with political bias that is rather overlooked. In our excellent desire to forward the health of the child by State care, there is a great danger that we shall not inculcate in the young citizen the duty that he himself will have to the State when he grows up. I am sure that if we get a guarantee that the fundamental loyalties will be taught to the children, all the money we spend on education will not be in vain.
        Sir BERTRAM FALLE: My right hon. Friend the Minister has given us the kind of speech that was expected from him—thorough and lucid—and if I ventureé to criticise him he will understand that I have no intention of attacking him. I am sure that he has been with us long enough not to take it ill from me if I criticise him for what he has said. At this time next year, I may have something more to say; he will have had a greater experience, and I trust then that my criticisms will be even milder than they are now. The tone of several speeches this afternoon has been extraordinarily high, particularly the two maiden speeches to which the Committee has listened and the speech of the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones). The Minister said very little about economy, but it is clear that the teachers' cut, which the teachers and some other people look upon as a sore point, will continue "for a considerable period," as Sir Harry Lauder says. There is a very small link between economy, efficiency and money. It may be economy to build a battleship, but a waste to build two cruisers. Nobody brought that home to us better than a famous Sirdar of Egypt, and, to those who lived in a later generation, the late Lord Haldane when at the War Office. There he produced economy and efficiency together, and he was the greatest War Minister we have ever had, largely because he understood those two facts.
        Economy is a purely relative matter at its worst. Several hon. Members have said that the Estimates are cut to the bone. I entirely disagree. Except in the matter of teachers' salaries, which may be an arguable point, there is considerable economy still to be made on education, and I will indicate two points where I believe that money could be saved with advantage. I do not much care for Royal Commissions, but I should like to see a small commission appointed—but not of Members of this House or of the other House—to inquire into the whole system of education. There have been many inquiries into the system, but I should like at least one more. I will give my reasons. In the last year of the last Government quite a number of boys called upon me asking me to find them employment. The eldest was 19 and the youngest was 15, and all these boys could neither read nor write. They could not read my writing, which is not surpris-
        1302
        ing, and they could not read print. They could sign their names, but when their signatures were taken away from them and brought back again to them, they could not be sure which was theirs. Think of what those boys must have cost the country. If a boy can read and write, he can teach himself any thing in the world that he wishes to learn. If he cannot read and write, he is done for, because it is not possible for him after he has left school to go to night school to learn to spell. There could be, I am sure, great economy in that matter, because if I saw such a number of boys myself, imagine the number of boys who do not like to come to a Member and admit that they are illiterate, and the numbers throughout the country must be very large.
        Considerable savings could be made also in the secondary schools. We have heard a great deal about the means test. A good many of us have had to put up with the means test in the matter of Income Tax for many years. That is a searching and thorough test. Five cases have come to my notice of men who have put their sons into secondary schools although they are comparatively rich men. One of them is so well off that he was able to give his son a small runabout car. It is iniquitous that a man should get the advantage of a secondary school for his boy for 12 or 14 guineas when it cost the country between £30 and £40. There should be a means test to prevent this kind of scandal. A friend of mine has a boy in one of the great public schools to which the boy won a scholarship because of his extraordinary ability. The father said that as he was a rich man he was not going to let his boy take an advantage over other boys, and that he intended to pay the fees to the last penny and so allow a poorer boy to take his place. If these five men had been animated by the same feeling, there would be five other poor boys now enjoying the advantages of a secondary education which has been denied them.
        6.30 p.m.
        A point to which I would draw attention is the formation of sixth forms. That means that new masters must be appointed for very small classes, at a very great expense to the country, although in such places there are technical colleges which are doing exactly the same work as those sixth forms would do, and

        1303
        doing it better, and having room for all who are likely to apply for admission. Probably the Minister is as well aware of these things as I am. The saving to be effected might not be enormous, but it would be considerable. There are thousands of boys in the secondary schools whose parents are in a position to pay for the education of their sons, and if we multiply the £30 to £35 that each boy in the secondary schools costs by that number there would be a saving of between £500,000 and £750,000. I condemn root and branch the formation of these sixth forms in places where there are technical colleges. It will only raise the cost of the curriculum, and will benefit no one.
        Another point I wish to bring forward concerns the new schools that are being built at a time when we have not more money than we want, and not as much as we need. To my knowledge one school is being built on nine acres of land. Nine acres of land for a school ! That is a wicked waste of money and of ground. Further, it is to be a single-storey school. What reason can be given for that beyond the fact that it may be more healthy if little children have not to run up and down stairs? One man said there would be a danger of their falling out of the windows upstairs. Indeed, those who are in favour of these single-storey schools will give any preposterous reason and argument for not building two-storey schools. Then there is the point about alloting nine acres of land for a school. Even if the land had been given it would be a very great extravagance. In criticising things as I have done I would like to reiterate that I realise that my right hon. Friend the Minister and his colleague are not to be blamed now, because they are new, but if they do these things next year we shall be able to come down on them with stronger arguments and a heavier censure. I ask them to inquire into the three matters I have mentioned and see whether something cannot be done on those lines.
        Colonel R. CHAPMAN: In rising to place before the Committee this afternoon some views upon economy in education I ask the House to extend to me that kindness which it usually shows to Members who are speaking for the first time. The Minister has pointed out to us how
        1304
        expenditure on education has risen in the 25 years since he first entered the House, and I am glad to hear that he is now prepared to mark time and consolidate the position before moving to his new objective in education. With a National Budget of £800,000,000, it is imperative that we should look in all directions to see where we can cut down expenditure, and I do not think that education, or any of the other Services, should be left out of the review. The enormous increase in expenditure upon education has been incurred, to a considerable extent, owing to the Burnham scale. Teachers' salaries in elementary schools have risen from £16,000,000 in 1921 to £39,000,000 to-day. I do not believe that by cutting down expenditure we should necessarily impair education. Parliament should make searching inquiry to see whether there are not some avenues along which we can effect a saving. On the Burnham Committee which set up the scales of salaries there is no representation from this House, and as we find half the money—and rather more, through the operation of the derating Act—there ought to be someone upon the Burnham Committee directly appointed from this House.
        With regard to the salaries that are paid, it should not be overlooked that the teachers had notice from the local authorities that it was their intention to apply for a revision of the scale, and the 10 per cent. cut, though unfortunately it was placed upon them without notice, does not give them so much cause for complaint, I think, as many people would try to make out. The teachers in elementary schools are segregated throughout their lives. It is the cleverer children at the age of 12 who become teachers. At the cost of the State they go through the secondary schools and the technical colleges, and at the age of 20 or 21 they enter upon their life as masters or mistresses, the men at a salary of £162 per year—after the cuts have been enforced—and rising by automatic increases to £330, and the women at £146 rising to £260. I do not think that, as a profession, they have any cause to complain. One point that I would like to stress concerns the pensions of teachers. Those who are passing from their work as teachers to pensions are awarded a gratuity of 1½ years salary. In the past year that has cost

        1305
        the country £1,200,000. That is paid to men and women who have only contributed 5 per cent. of their salaries for the last ten years. In no other Service—neither the Army, Navy, Air Force or the Civil Service—are there pensions of any such magnitude as are paid to teachers, and in none of them is there a gratuity. One way of securing economy would be to cut out those gratuities. Even after that had been done the teachers would have very good pensions. I feel regret that the increase of salary given to teachers during the past ten years had not made some of them more ambitious to advance themselves academically. In 1921 1.3 per cent. of the teachers in the elementary schools were graduates of the university. To-day that percentage has increased to only 3.7. I think that is an unfortunate thing. The good pay they have had should have encouraged them to try to make themselves more efficient academically.
        Another point to which I would direct attention is the variation of expenditure in different areas. In September I addressed a letter to the "Times" in which I pointed out that the average expenditure upon an elementary school child throughout the country was £12 15s. 0d., whereas in South Shields it was £9 10s. 6d. If the cost throughout the country could be reduced to the level of the cost in South Shields there would be a saving of over £16,000,000 a year. I appreciate the fact that that is not possible. One cannot expect that the teaching in London and some of the areas round about can be carried on for the same figure as in a provincial town, but I think it would be well worth while for the Minister to inquire whether the variations in the different districts are justified. The average cost at present is £13 2s. 6d. In London the cost is £18 12s. 0d., in East Ham £17 15s. 0d., in Bradford £15 15s. 0d. and in South Shields £9 15s. 0d. The fact that for the same type of education and the same grade of salaries we are paying £6 more in Bradford than in South Shields, and that the nation is contributing nearly £100,000 a year more for educating children in Bradford than would be paid for the same number of children in South Shields, is a justification for inquiry to ascertain why Bradford is so much more expensive.
        1306
        Then there is the question of loan charges. Why should loan charges in Blackpool amount to £1 12s. 0d. and in Bath to 4s. 4d. It shows, I think, that there has been undue extravagance over the building of schools in Blackpool. In one place in the North of England a secondary school was erected at a cost of £130 a place, and in another area the cost was only £60 a place. There is room for inquiry into such matters. Then there is the question of administration and inspection, a point on which I think I shall have the support of the National Union of Teachers. Many local authorities have an inspectorate of their own, but I cannot see why the inspector of the Board of Education and the head teachers are not sufficient to manage education. What is the result of this policy? I find that the average expenditure on this item throughout the country is 11s. 9d. per child. What reason is there why Leicester should spend for this service 16s. 1d. per child and London £1. 6s. 7d. London spends more than five times as much per child as South Shields, where the cost is 5s. Authorities employ large and highly-paid administrative staffs and authorities spend heavily on an inspectorate of their own instead of relying on the Board's inspectors and putting faith in the head teachers.
        Then there is the item "Other expenditure," which includes rates, books, heating, lighting and repairs. The average cost of these services is £2, but in West Ham the cost is £4, in Norwich £3, and in Middlesbrough 19s. 7d. The "special services" include nursery schools, physical training, feeding of children, medical inspection, schools for defective children, and evening play centres, and the average cost for these services is 16s. 4d. per child. On these services, West Hartlepool spends 6s. 3d. and Bradford £2 6s. What justification can there be for that large difference in the expenditure upon those services? I suggest that this variation in the cost has arisen through the system of percentage grants. If we had had a block grant system, there would not have been the same encouragement for local authorities to be extravagant. I would like to point out that there are 155,000 children under the age of five who are being educated at a cost to the State of over £2,000,000. I sug-

        1307
        gest that that is an item which ought to be dropped out of our Estimates in these difficult times. I do not think that it is necessary to educate children of such a tender age, and I ask what education can be given to a child at the age of three when the education that is really required by the child should be given by the mother at home.
        I have pointed out some lines along which economies might be made. I have pointed out that, without affecting education, it is possible to make large savings on some items. I hope hon. Members will forgive me if I close on a somewhat parochial strain. I have mentioned South Shields, and I make no apology for the fact that the cost of education there is at a very low figure. South Shields has been forced to economise. It is a town of 114,000 inhabitants with 14,000 unemployed, and this has been its condition for several years. Its people are hard working when they have it to do. Its main industries are coal, shipping, shipbuilding, and marine engineering, and those are industries which the President of the Board of Trade has told us have shown no improvement. But we have not stood still. In 1920 we had a debt of £500,000 and now the debt of South Shields is £2,500,000; £1,000,000 of that has been spent on housing, and the other £1,000,000 has been spent on schemes to relieve unemployment. I do not think hon. Members on the Labour benches will object to that expenditure.
        We have endeavoured to economise all round, and we have been successful. We have reduced the rates in South Shields from 19s. 6d. in 1920 to 10s. 6d. to-day. What does that mean to the workingman? It means a saving of 2s. 1½d. per week on a four-roomed house and 2s. 9d. on a five-roomed house. In South Shields we are now turning our attention to the slums, and we are building 1,000 houses to help to find accommodation for those who are displaced in slum areas. We are letting houses at figures which I am sure will stagger hon. Members. We are letting a three-roomed house at 5s. 5d. per week, including rates, a four-roomed house at 6s. 6d., and a five-roomed house at 7s. 6d. I suggest that in this way we have done much for the workman who is in employment, and much more for the unemployed
        1308
        by keeping down the cost of education and the rates and so lowering rents. Therefore, I make no excuse for economising on education in South Shields.
        We have always received good reports from the Board of Education, and, if academic success is any guide, I would like to point out that in the school certificate examination our secondary scholars during the past four years have had a percentage of passes of 90 against 66 for the rest of the country. Perhaps I may be allowed to point out that the President of the Board of Trade and Lord Justice Wright obtained their early education in South Shields. For these reasons, I appeal to the President of the Board of Education to look into these variations in expenditure in different districts in order to see whether he cannot save much more than he proposes to save this year. Extravagance does not of necessity mean efficiency nor does economy of necessity mean inefficiency.
        Mr. J. JONES: I do not pretend to have any expert knowledge upon educational matters like some hon. Members who have addressed the House. On this side we are enthusiastic about education because we know the want of it. I have done my best to give my children the chance in life which I never had myself, and I am surprised to discover that Members of this House look upon education from the point of view of how much it costs, and that no other factors seem to be considered. I have been to South Shields quite a number of times, and, if the administration there has produced such terrible consequences as those stated by the hon. and gallant Member for Houghton-le-Spring (Colonel Chapman), I am sorry to hear it. The hon. and gallant Member has boasted of the education which South Shields has provided, but I am ready to place West Ham, with all its poverty and economic experience, as regards its success in education against South Shields any time. I have always stood for free education in our elementary schools.
        The hon. and gallant Member for Houghton-le-Spring has just asserted that he would like to see the nursery schools put out of our educational system, but he does not seem to know what is accomplished by those nursery schools in London. The hon. and gallant Member

        1309
        spoke about cheap houses, but many of the people in my constituency cannot afford to rent a house and they have to rent rooms. Many families in London have been brought up in a single room, in which the mother is the only protector of the children, because the father is out all day working at the docks, and consequently the mother becomes the guide, philosopher and friend to the children. I do not think any hon. Member would be prepared to suggest that even in those circumstances the working-class woman does not do her duty to her children. Nursery schools have become an absolute necessity under our present economic conditions, and we have always supported them as part of our education policy.
        The hon. and gallant Member for Houghton-le-Spring has shown that education costs more in one place than in another, but what has that to do with the question? Education is dealt with on the basis of population. Why should hon. Members be so anxious to cot down the cost of education? The hon. and gallant Member also dealt with the housing problem, but, if you build houses for them, and do not educate the children, what will they do with the houses? They will simply make slums of them, because they will not have been trained to use a house properly. Very often slums exist because the people have not been sufficiently educated to know how to use a house properly when they get one.
        7.0 p.m.
        In West Ham we spend a large sum of money upon feeding the children. The Government find a certain portion of the money, and in my constituency we have determined that in no circumstances shall a child go to school hungry. The hon. and gallant Member for North Portsmouth (Sir B. Falle) criticised the expenditure upon a public school for which nine acres of ground had been purchased, but when I was in Portsmouth, only a few weeks ago, I found barracks there on a 100-acre site which was to be used to train young men to fight for their country. In West Ham we are lucky to get one acre of ground for a school. The hon. and gallant Member for North Portsmouth does not believe in cutting down the Army and Navy expenditure, although he believes in cutting down facilities for the education of the people. Keep them
        1310
        ignorant and they will become soldiers quicker. Educate them, and they forget all about the honour and glory of killing their fellow-men in some other part of the world.
        We on these benches realise that the only way out of these difficulties is that educational idealism should be based on a sound line in a healthy body, and that the more we can give the children of the country educational opportunities the better it will be for the nation and the future. As for myself, I realise my own lack of education and have done my best to see that my own children got a better education. As to those people who are so enthusiastic about the Empire, what kind of Empire are they going to hand on to the common people of this country if their ideals are carried into effect? Do they imagine they will always be able to keep on waving the Union Jack in front of the Union Jackasses? Do they imagine they will always be able to feed the people on their patriotic pap? Will they always be able to make them believe that the more they shout about the Empire the more prosperous they will become? We are now cutting down education, but I can never understand why those, who have had all the opportunities of education, always want to cut down the opportunities of those who have not had them. West Ham has always had a great proportion of its scholars who went in for the Oxford and Cambridge examinations at the top of the list, yet most of them were the sons and daughters of dockside labourers. If the working-class children of this country had the same opportunities other children have had, they would not be so handicapped in the struggle for life.
        We do not wish children to be educated to fight against each other in the factory and the workshop, but to co-operate with each other. We want them educated, not to go up a narrow stairway, but to go together up a common broadway for the solution of their political and economic problems. The Board of Education does not give us much hope nor does the President of the Board of Education, because he has simply to repeat the Edison Bell record of "his master's voice." Hon. Members opposite always say that economy must be practised in every possible direction, and yet, though they say that there is no

        1311
        money in the country, every loan which is floated on good security is subscribed in less time than is allowed in the prospectus. Whoever wants money can get plenty so long as the security is good. We have no money for our own people, but we have plenty of money for people in other parts of the world, even so far away as Honolulu. We do not believe much of the tale you tell us about the Government of the country being in ruins. The Empire exists, although, if some people had their way, it would not exist much longer. We are trying to save the people and trying to make the people believe in themselves. When we cut down on education, we are cutting down the only basis on which the people of our country can realise themselves. The better educated they are the better able they are to face the problems of the future and the better capable of realising their possibilities.
        When I heard all the educated people talking to-day, it made me feel sorry I ever went to school. With all the experience and chances they have had, after having been to universities and having had everything given to them that they ought not to have had, it made me feel sorry to hear them talking about education, because I have met agricultural labourers in the place where I was born who could give me better reasons for opposing education than the hon. Members have given this afternoon. They believe that they have had it all themselves and that they should keep to themselves all they have and cling on to all their privileges. We claim that education is a great national matter. It may not be perfect—nothing is in this world—but we have done the best we can and we can do no more. I support our party in rejecting the proposition that economies in education are necessary and desirable. We can support economy in other directions. Economy in protecting life is sacrificing life, while economy in the direction of preventing the sacrifice of life is something that we can support.
        I protest against this policy of reducing educational facilities in order to "crib, cabin and confine" educational opportunities. Of all the great countries of Europe previous to the War we spent less on educational progress and develop-
        1312
        ment than our competitors. Now we are told that, although we have made a little progress, we must put the brake on and stand still. We are going to put the brake on when we should release the brake. We are told that the national interest demands efficiency and economy. I have heard that tale so often. I have been 27 years a member of a local authority, and ever since I was first elected I have been fighting the cry of "economy with efficiency." The economy is always begun on the worker. Those who advocate this always want to save money at the expense of the bottom dog and they always begin at the bottom by cutting wages down, by cutting down the salaries of teachers and increasing the size of the classes, but they never touch the man at the top, because he is sacred. Tomorrow we shall have the Super-tax and the Chancellor of the Exchequer will tell us where he has saved the money. He will follow the old policy, "When in doubt play on the worker. Phil Garlic will foot the bill." This economy in education is suicidal as far as the nation is concerned. Other nations are not acting in this way, but are developing their resources and increasing their educational facilities. Instead of going in the directon proposed by the President of the Board of Education, we ought to say that we are not going to put the brake on, but are going to open up the flood gates of opportunity for all our children and to make it God's highway from the elementary school to the university.
        Miss CAZALET: I would like to congratulate the President on his speech this afternoon. He has made the best of a bad job in the very difficult financial circumstances in which we find ourselves to-day. There are more extreme and fanatical views held on education than on almost any other subject. We all know the type of person who says, "What is the use of all this tomfoolery of education? Sheer waste of money!" On the other hand, there are those who think that all children should remain in the classroom until they are 18 or over. Undoubtedly, the real interests of the children lie with those who take the medium view. Education, like housing, must be considered outside party politics if it is to be effective. Some hon. Members opposite say that the present reductions in education will result in the

        1313
        deterioration of the Service. I do not take that view. The three-year programmes of very progressive educational development, which have been pursued by all local authorities for a number of years, make the present economies far less severe than might otherwise have been the case. Seeing what rapid developments have taken place, it may be wise to have a period of stocktaking so that full consideration can be given to the position gained.
        We learn from the Estimates to-day and from what the President has told us that there is to be a reduction of over £5,400,000. It is a very considerable sum, but we have got to remember that, in spite of it, we shall be spending £82,000,000 on this one Service alone, which I find is an increase of £51,000,000 in the past 20 years. It is interesting to note that during the same period there has been a decrease in child population in the elementary schools of a little over half-a-million. It was never suggested in 1924 that our educational system was being starved and therefore it cannot be fairly stated to-day that, with an increase of £8,000,000 and with a further decrease of child population, this Service is suffering through parsimony.
        There is no doubt that the President has been greatly helped in his task during the past year by the assistance he has had from local authorities. This assistance has been given freely, because it has been fully realised that the future of every child depends on the secure financial condition of the country. May I give the Committee one example of how local authorities have assisted the Government? In London, owing to the change of formula, the London County Council on the basis of last year's estimates will lose in grant from the board no less than £1,900,000 and the difficulty has been how to avoid throwing this huge extra burden on the rates. By the most stringent and careful economy and without actually injuring any part of this great service, the London County Council have been able to make a reduction in their Estimates of £1,500,000 for the coming year. No educational facility has been sacrificed, except in the small case of prizes, which are to be abandoned for one year. I am not going to try to explain the formula to the Committee as
        1314
        the hon. Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris) suggested that I might do. If I took that course, the Committee, which is not very full, would empty still further. I will just put one point with regard to the formula. The difficulties experienced by local authorities in saving on education are accentuated by the fact that, owing to the working of this new formula, roughly only £60 out of every £100 saved goes to the local authority; the rest goes to the Board.
        It is obvious from the Estimates, and from what has been said by the President of the Board of Education this afternoon, that by far the largest economy is made by the cuts in the teachers' salaries. Of course we all regret those cuts, as we regret all the other cuts and economies that have had to be made. It is a common fallacy that the teachers are a body of very much overpaid men and women, who have easy lives and long holidays. Nothing could be further from the truth. I do not think that the public fully realise the amount of voluntary work that teachers do outside the regular school hours, in organising sports and games and any number of other things in the interests of their schools. Undoubtedly they do that work for love, but it is none the less of a very strenuous nature.
        There is just one criticism that I should like to make with regard to the May Report. The Burnham scales were framed to produce remuneration suitable for the great profession represented by the nation's teachers, and I do not think it is fair to compare the present salaries of teachers with their pre-War scales, because, as everyone knows, before the War their pay was far too low and most inadequate. From my own knowledge of a good many teachers, I can say that they have done their very best to cooperate loyally in the economies, and have taken their cuts in the right spirit, but I think there is a certain amount of justifiable resentment in regard to pensions. I have had numerous letters from teachers, especially those nearing the end of their teaching life, for, as the Committee may know, teachers' pensions are calculated on their last five years of service; and I would ask the President, when the times permit, which I hope will be very soon, to give the position of the

        1315
        teachers as regards the pension difficulty, as well as the flat rate, his careful and sympathetic consideration.
        Although I realise that at the present moment economy must be the order of the day, I would, like several other speakers this afternoon, ask the President to do everything that he can to see that local authorities go forward with their schemes of reorganisation. There is no doubt that, where these reorganisations, with a break at eleven plus, have been working for a certain time in the urban areas, they have been proving a great success. They ensure that an even balance of attention is kept between the children of all the varying degrees of ability. In the junior schools it is possible to concentrate on laying the foundations of primary education, and the figures show that far larger numbers are going on to the central and secondary schools. The improved classification made possible by the size of the senior departments is giving far greater scope for practical work, especially in the domestic and manual training centres.
        The public at large still believe that very little technical and practical work is done, and many people say that they would not object to such a large expenditure on education if they thought that the children were learning something useful. As a matter of fact, a great deal has been done recently with regard to technical education in this country. From figures which I got from the Board the other day, I see that the number of boys and girls under 16 receiving full-time technical education has doubled in this country during the past eight or nine years. In London alone, during the last session, 1930–31, there were over 250,000 students attending various technical, vocational, and cultural schools where every type of instruction is given. To give one illustration, there is, quite near to this House, a special school for boy waiters, by which it is hoped to counteract one form of dumping at foreign hands. The evening institutes, as everyone knows, also do a great deal in the practical line, and they are now a very important part of our great educational system. Their popularity is well illustrated by the fact that at some of them it has been found that three generations of one family are attending classes of
        1316
        instruction together—more than we can, so far, boast of in the House of Commons.
        I was extremely interested to bear what the President said with regard to foreign countries, especially with regard to Czechoslovakia. I am glad to say that we have here quite a number of enlightened firms, and also the much abused Post Office, who are arranging for their younger employés to attend continuation schools. I sincerely hope that the Board will do everything that they can to develop this particular line of education. Almost 70 per cent. of the children leaving the elementary schools in London last year went on to some further form of education, which is a real testimoney to the work that is being done in the schools, and shows that the money we spend on education is a very good long-term investment. If any further justification were needed for our large expenditure on this Service, surely it is provided by the events of last October, when the high intelligence of the people in all parts of the country rose above mere party feeling, and returned to the House of Commons a National party pledged to a great national policy.
        Mr. GOLDIE: In rising to address the Committee for the first time, I confess that I find considerable difficulty in following such an expert as the hon. Member for East Islington (Miss Cazalet), but I feel in almost greater difficulty when I find myself in agreement, with regard to underlying principles, with the hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. J. Jones). I am convinced that the whole basis of education in this country consists in giving to every child that is worthy of the chance an opportunity of going right through from the elementary school to the university.
        The hon. Member for Silvertown asked those of us who differ from him politically what sort of Empire we proposed to hand on to the next generation? I would remind him, however, that it was not the public school education of the early part of the century, it was not the elementary education of the country, but the combined common sense which all of us, of all classes, had learned in all classes of schools, that enabled those of us who were privileged to do so, to do what we could to make the Empire safe for future generations. As I look

        1317
        back on those years from 1914 to 1919, and think of the friendships which I made, and which I am glad to say still continue, with people of all classes—from the public schools and from the elementary schools of the North of England—I feel that, if happiness such as that can be brought into a life such as mine, I will do all that I can as long as I am a Member of this House to see that elementary education gets a fair chance throughout the country. I should have hesitated to speak for the first time in this Chamber on such a subject, on which I do not profess to be an expert, but it is fitting after my experience, first as a candidate in 1929 and then during the last six months as Member for an industrial constituency, that I should pay my tribute to the work done by the teaching profession, particularly in the industrial constituencies.
        One hon. Member spoke about nine acres being used for a secondary school, but when I go through those schools in what I might go so far as to call the slum areas of the industrial districts of the North, and compare them with the public school to which I was sent—by, if the hon. Member for Silvertown will bear with me, the sacrifices of my people, who were in a position to make sacrifices, and I say frankly that, were it not for those sacrifices, I should not be standing here to-day—when I think of the conditions that I enjoyed in one of the great public schools of England, where I learned what has been so useful to me in after life, and when I realise that exactly the same point of view is being taught to the children in these slum areas of the North of England, I take my hat off to the teachers for what they are doing at the present moment. When we are told that education will suffer from these cuts, I venture to say that it will not suffer at the moment, because of the loyalty of the teaching profession to the cause in which they believe, that of passing on education to the younger generation, and, above all, their loyalty to that which has been so useful to themselves in life.
        It is my fundamental belief that education is a vital necessity to this country, and I would say again that my ideal is that every child who is worthy of it should have a chance of going right
        1318
        through from the elementary school to the university; but the President of the Board of Education will forgive me if I venture to say that I have some considerable doubt whether, under our present system of education in this country, that is exactly what we are attaining. Are we satisfied that we are at the present moment giving the children the best education that we can? As far as I can judge—and I speak on the authority of a Noble Prelate in the North of England who was headmaster of the public school where I was educated—the system of school certificates, which, in my opinion, are utterly unnecessary except in the case of those children who are going to the universities, is simply compelling the teachers of this country in the secondary schools to turn out, so to speak, machine-made products of education.
        Think of the thousands of children of 14, 15, or 16 in all walks of life who are trying their hardest to pass the school certificate examination, knowing that their future depends upon it, and that only by passing that examination can they in some way repay what their parents have done for them. What happens in the case of children who, through no fault of their own, fail to pass that examination? Straight away there are closed to them avenues of education or professions which otherwise would have been open to them. Take the great profession of hospital nursing. I believe that in many hospitals in London it is still necessary to have the school certificate. Again, in the case of a child who has been good at games, who may have been captain of the elementary or secondary school, the same thing happens. She is told, "It is no good trying to turn you, my dear child, into a games mistress; where is your school certificate?" On the other hand, if you go to one of those great secretarial places in London, and ask whether the daughter of a man in another walk of life has got a school certificate, the answer you receive is, "My dear Sir, all that we require is a character from the head mistress."
        I appeal to my right hon. Friend to consider, I will not say the abolition, but the modification of this system of school certificates throughout the country. Let them be retained in cases where they

        1319
        have to be made the basis of entry into a profession, or the basis of matriculation at the universities, but, if the school certificate could be modified, and if the great teaching profession had the chance of modelling the material which is placed in their hands, I venture to say that the education would be even better than it has been in the past, and many children in this country would owe a debt of gratitude to the President of the Board of Education, because they would have been enabled to face life at the very outset in a way which, by reason of these school certificates they are now unable to do.
        It being Half-past Seven of the Clock, and there being Private Business set down, by direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means under Standing Order No. 8, further Proceeding was postponed, without Question put.

  BLACKPOOL IMPROVEMENT BILL [Lords]. (By Order.)
  Read a Second time, and commited.

  SUPPLY.
  Again considered in Committee.
  [Sir DENNIS HERBERT in the Chair.]
  Postponed Proceeding resumed on Question proposed in consideration of Question,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £26,892,676, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1933, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Board of Education, and of the various Establishments connected therewith, including sundry Grants in Aid."
  Question again proposed, "That a sum, not exceeding £26,892,576, be granted for the said Service."
  Mr. GOLDIE: I fear that, in addressing the Committee for the first time, I may have expressed myself, if not at undue length, at any rate, somewhat strongly. I only want to say, in conclusion, that in looking back, as one whose privilege it was as a younger man to be a school manager to two elementary schools and who since being returned to the House has had the honour of
  1320
  being placed on the council of one of the great northern universities, in my opinion the basis of our education is a sound basis. Relying on the loyalty of the teaching profession, which has done so much for the country in the past, I can see nothing in these economies which will in any way be detrimental to the cause which Members of both sides of the Committee have so greatly at heart.
  Mr. McENTEE: I want to bring the Committee back to a point of view in regard to education which I came into this House with the deliberate intention of putting forward when the opportunity presented itself. In doing that, I hope I may congratulate the hon. Member who has just sat down and who gave expression to the idea which I desire to express. He said he believed that the opportunity should be given to every child to pass from the elementary school to the university. It is true that every child would not be able to take advantage of the opportunity even if it were presented, and it is equally true that it has not been the intention of any Government in my time to open that ladder of free education right through to the university. There may possibly have been the intention in one or two Governments behind which I have sat, but the opportunity was not there. There has never been a Government which had the opportunity and the power to open that ladder in the way which the hon. Member suggested. I hope he will get many more opportunities and will accept them, as I hope to exert myself in putting that point of view forward.
  We have been told by a number of speakers—I have heard it expressed on many occasions recently—that there was a need for economy and that one of the things that had to suffer was education. If there is that need for economy, why is it that the class that is least able, because they have been compelled to economise all their lives, is, in this matter of education as in all others, harder hit by the economy axe than any other class in society. I have heard it said in this House—as far as I can gauge, with no truth in it at all—that the education provided for the average working-class child in the elementary schools is of such a high character that many of the middle-class are not able to give an

  1321
  equally good education to their children. Similar expressions have been used today, particularly by an hon. Member below the Gangway on this side in a maiden speech and by the hon. Baronet the Member for North Portsmouth (Sir B. Falle). If that is so, the obvious thing for the middle-class people to do is to take advantage of the opportunity that is provided for them and to send their children to the elementary schools. It is obvious that very few of them do so. They are in a position to give their children a, private education which they consider is better than can be obtained in the elementary school; otherwise, I do not think they would be foolish enough to spend money on privately educating their children and keeping them away from the opportunities that are open and free to them in the schools to which the ordinary working-class child goes.
  I am particularly interested in re-organisation. I have played some part in the re-organisation of the schools in my division and have watched the whole course of the re-organisation and have seen the results of it. It has been of very great value indeed to the children, who have benefited very materially in many parts of the country. I want to ask the Minister why the opportunity is being denied to other educational authorities which have not re-organised their schools. It may be said that they did not take advantage of the opportunities which they had in the early days, and it is a sort of punishment for them now that the opportunity is no longer available in the same degree. It is not the education authorities you are punishing, but the children who are unfortunate enough to live in the area where a very reactionary education committee has control. The children are to be penalised because the opportunities that their education committee had to reorganise the schools were not taken advantage of in the early days of the movement. The special building grants have been cut down and every opportunity is taken to prevent the building of nursery schools.
  Children in the special schools and in the schools for physically and mentally defective children are all suffering because the education committees in their areas have not taken advantage of opportunities that were offered them. Is it
  1322
  fair to inflict on children a punishment which they will carry all their lives because their education committees happen to be reactionary? The Board believe that the re-organisation system is essential, because they have sanctioned and encouraged it, and they have encouraged the building and equipping and staffing of special schools. If that is so, why on earth do they expect those children who have not been given the opportunity to be punished as they are? In areas very close to the one in which I live the children are not getting the same advantages as those in my area.
  I was interested in what has been said about the school site of nine acres. Complaint was made by the hon. Member for North Portsmouth that they actually built this school on one floor. I have had some experience of school buildings and, if I had my will, I would not build anything in any part of the country except one floor schools. It is impossible to do it in overcrowded areas in London and big industrial towns, but to complain that in one place where apparently there was plenty of room they should build a one-floor school is to be hopelessly out-of-date and reactionary.
  I should like to have an opportunity of saying, "Hear, hear" to the hon. Member for East Islington (Miss Cazalet) and the remarks she made about teachers. I have been in pretty close contact with the teaching profession and I have the highest admiration for their work in the schools and for what they do for the children outside the schools. I can understand the point of view of teachers who entered into a contract as binding as any contract can be; and, when that contract is broken, they had a right to complain, and they did complain, although it has been said by one or two Members that they took it in the right spirit. I agree that they took it in the right spirit, but I do not think that my view about the spirit would be the same as that expressed a little earlier in the Debate by certain other hon. Members. The right spirit to take in regard to a cut in our standard of conditions is to fight it and to protest against it. An injustice was done to the teachers, and the only thing they could do, in justice to themselves and to what we often call in this country the sacredness of a con-

  1323
  tract, was to protest and to fight against it as vigorously as they could. The injustice was recognised to the extent of 33⅓ per cent. in the earlier days of the conflict between teachers and the National Government, and the cut which it was intended to make was not inflicted. It has been said that the cuts in education are not to be permanent. I have heard that sort of thing said about other things. We were told that the cuts were made on account of necessity and that they were not necessarily permanent.
  I would point out to the right hon. Gentleman, who, I am glad to see, has returned, that childhood is not permanent, and that any injustice which is inflicted upon the child to-day will be felt through the whole of the child's life. Is it fair when we realise that there are plenty of rich men and women in the country? The hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. J. Jones) made reference to the fact that almost every loan, in respect to which the security and rate of interest are good, is subscribed 10 or a dozen times over. I have read to-day with considerable interest, without having any personal knowledge of art, that certain pictures have been withdrawn from auction after bids have been made, for one picture of £95,000, for another of £23,000 and for another of something over £8,000. If there are people who can go to an auction and offer such sums for pictures for their own private galleries, I am sure that there are plenty of sources still to be tapped without tapping the source of education and inflicting an injustice upon children for the remainder of their lives. I am afraid that the present Government will go down in history as the Government who robbed the children of their childhood. I do not think that there is anything in this world I should dread more than to be charged with having robbed a child of its childhood. Everybody appears to agree to give lip-service to education, and to say that every child ought to have an equal opportunity, but if hon. Members opposite had to express their view by voting in the House of Commons nearly every one would vote against such a, proposal. In other words, they are more concerned with preserving the present order of society and everything for which it stands
  1324
  than they are for the future of the children or anything else.
  You are robbing the children in certain places in the country. You are taking away advantages from some children in some parts which you have already given to other children in other parts of the country. Hon. Members may pay what lip-service they like to education, but the fact remains—and, after all, it is the policy of the Government—that all the cuts and hardships as far as education is concerned are inflicted upon working-class children. Hon. Members talk about the system of education and the advantages it gives and make comparisons with the education of 20 or 30 years ago, but they never make comparisons between their own children and the children of the working classes who attend the elementary schools. There are few Members of the Committee who would be satisfied with the standard of education to be got out of even the best elementary, central or secondary school for their own children. As one who has forced himself up from below, I represent that class which is still looked upon as a class which ought not to have as high a standard of education as that which others demand for their children and the children of their class. I do not blame any man who has the means for providing the highest possible standard of education for his children, but I demand for every child in the nation the same standard as that which, fortunately for them, others are able to demand for their own children.
  We shall not get very much from the present Government. I had some hopes in regard to the right hon. Gentleman when I heard that he had been appointed to the Board of Education, but my opinion changed when I found what cuts were to be made in education and when I realised the consequences of those cuts. Speaking as a practical administrator in a district where the majority of the people are ordinary working class people, and where we have taken advantage of every possible opportunity presented to us by successive Governments to advance education, we are still very far from the standard of education which many of our children if they were given the opportunity, could use to their own advantage and for the advantage of the nation. The free places in our secondary schools have been reduced in number, and the cost to the parents has been increased. Most of

  1325
  the parents who send their children to the secondary schools to-day have to make very great sacrifices. The fees have been increased at a time when taxes are heavy, and when wages and salaries and other possible sources of income have been reduced.
  Hundreds and thousands of children all over the country who have the ability, and have proved it by passing examinations, to take advantage of the opportunities in the secondary schools, are prevented from doing so because there are no places for them. In 1924 the then President of the Board of Education permitted an increase in the number of free places, and I hoped that that step would be progressive, and that a further increase might come in the near future. Instead, we have had a reactionary step. We have had a reduction of the number of free places in many districts, and an increase in the fees charged. I hope, if there is any surplus knocking about after the Budget has been presented to-morrow, that the President of the Board of Education will make a persistent attempt on behalf of the children who have been robbed of the opportunities of childhood to restore them in the interests both of the children and of the nation.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: The hon. Member for West Walthamstow (Mr. McEntee) made reference to my absence from the Committee. I only wish to say to him and to the Committee that I have been engaged on important Government business; otherwise I should have been present throughout the Debate.
  Mr. McENTEE: I happened to see the right hon. Gentleman coming into the Chamber, but I was not making any complaint.
  Mr. LECKIE: I have listened with great interest to the very varied Debate. There are many points upon which I might be very much tempted to dwell, but I shall resist the temptation and speak specially upon one or two points which I wish to bring before the Committee. I join in the congratulations to my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Education for his very helpful and able statement in introducing the Estimates. I am sure that all sections of the Committee will agree that we are fortunate in having a man of such sincere sympathy, exceptional ability and know-
  1326
  ledge at the head of our educational affairs. The President has made out a good case for the reduced Estimates which he presents. The country realises the necessity of strict economy, even though the hon. Gentleman the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones) and other speakers on the Opposition side did not seem to realise the urgency of the matter. If they did not realise the exceptional crisis which existed in the autumn of last year, they are the only persons in the country, I think, who did not. The country at large realised that we were faced with a tremendous financial crisis which required very drastic treatment, and which, happily, received the treatment which was necessary in order to save the situation.
  8.0 p.m.
  Reference has been made to the cuts in expenditure, and especially to the cut in the capital expenditure, since the National Government took office. It seems to me that there, if anywhere, was just the point at which a cut could be made without undue hardship. I agree that it has had a serious effect in preventing the completion of new schools, and, in other directions, the improvement of buildings. But we are assured that it is only of a temporary character, and I sincerely hope that as soon as the finances of the country get into a better condition we shall be able to go forward with building as we have in the past. At the same time, I feel a great deal of sympathy with what has been said by many speakers with regard to the teachers' salaries. There is no doubt that the cut involved the breaking of agreements between the teachers and the local authorities, and it could only be justified by the very serious financial crisis. I join in the appeal to the Government to consider the very strong claim of the teachers for the reconsideration of the matter at the earliest possible moment. Notwithstanding some of the things which have been said in the Committee to-day, I feel that education is no longer the Cinderella of the social services of this country as it used to be. I am very glad to note the great improvement and the better feeling in the country with regard to education than existed in the past. I hope that the interest will be maintained, and even increased, as the years go on. We have made wonderful advances in education since the War.

  1327
  We are deeply grateful to all those who have been responsible for the development that has taken place in education since the War. Education is more needed to-day than ever before. It is our greatest safeguard against Communism and revolution, and if we realise that, we shall know that we are not spending money in vain when we spend it on education. I wish to speak specially with reference to education expenditure as it affects the local authorities. While it would probably be generally admitted that, ideally, the burden of expenditure on social services should be equally distributed throughout the State, at the same time the system which has obtained for many years in this country—that a proportion of local public expenditure should be met by funds raised locally—has been shown by experience to be fundamentally sound.
  Generally speaking, perhaps, the best means of equalising public expenditure burdens throughout the country is by meeting the cost of such expenditure from central funds. It would seem, therefore, that the two principles which I have just enunciated are to a certain extent in opposition. It is the task of those responsible for framing grant formulae to endeavour to reconcile these two conflicting principles. In effect, as contribution from central funds means equalisation, the task is to equalise rate burdens. The somewhat complicated grant formula for elementary education which existed prior to September of last year, and even that which is in effect to-day, represent an attempt at this equalisation. The deduction of the sevenpenny rate is an attempt at equalisation, but the effect of this deduction is at the present time comparatively feeble.
  In the memorandum prepared by the Board of Education for Lord Meston's Committee it was set out as the Board's opinion that grants should
  "vary with the ability of the locality to meet the expenditure."
  In other words, that there should be an attempt to arrive at some measure of rate equalisation. Let us see how it is working out. I have been looking through the Board of Education's List 43, which is a return showing the cost per child for elementary education in England and Wales for the year 1930–1931, the latest
  1328
  year for which figures are available, and comparing it with the return showing rates levied for elementary education covering the same period, I find three county boroughs where the rate for elementary education was less than 1s.—Bournemouth 8½d., Eastbourne 10d., and Blackpool 11½d. Yet these towns were able to spend £12 19s. 8d., £15 2s. 4d., and £14 1s. 3d., respectively, per child, as against the expenditure in my own constituency of £11 10s. 9d. per child and a rate of 3s. 9⅞d. I quote my own constituency because it is the area with which I am naturally most familiar. I could, however, quote with equal effect Stoke-on-Trent, where a rate demand of 3s. 10⅞d. allowed an expenditure of only £10 4s. 11d. per child; St. Helens, where the cost per child is £12 4s. 2d.—less than in any of the three lowly rated towns which I have cited—and the rate demand is 4s. 10⅜d.
  Admittedly, the withdrawal of the 50 per cent. minimum limit of grant will mean a slight rise in the rate demand in the three towns which I first, mentioned, but the position as I have set it out will not be materially affected, as the corresponding rate increase, as I see it, will in each case be something round about 5d. only. One feels that this state of things merits the serious attention of the Committee, particularly as it is an industrial area—where elementary education is most needed—that the burden falls most heavily. The recent change in the grant formula relieving the taxpayer at the expense of the ratepayer will tend to magnify these discrepancies, except in the case of the few areas which formerly received grant under the 50 per cent. minimum grant Clause of the Fisher Education Act. One realises that central funds had to be relieved, but one cannot help wishing that at the same time there might have been inserted into the grant formula fuller provisions tending to equalise the burden on local rates. I hope that this point will receive fresh consideration from the Minister.
  As Member for a necessitous area, in which I am also chairman of the Education Committee, I have felt it my duty to bring before the House the question of the glaring inequalities of rate burdens in the hope that steps may be taken to lighten the heavy financial load which rests on willing but weak shoulders.

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  Might I also plead for more generous provision for the building of new schools as soon as the financial situation improves? The 50 per cent. grant by the late Government has been of untold benefit to highly rated local authorities like ours, and the sooner it is restored in some measure the better it, will be for education in the necessitous areas. I am sorry to have taken up so much time, but I do feel that this is a very important matter, and I wanted to make an appeal on behalf of necessitous areas like our own. The great Napoleon put it on record at St. Helena, near the end of his life, that
  "There are only two forces; the spirit and the sword, and in the end the sword is always conquered by the spirit."
  I think I shall have the Committee with me when I. claim that education is a great spiritual force in this country and that our aim should be to expand it on sound lines in every way we can, even if we have to do it by further reductions in the expenditure on the forces that represent the sword.
  Notice taken that 40 Members were not present; Committee counted, and 40 Members being present—
  Dr. O'DONOVAN: I think it is worthy of record that the attempt, innocent in itself, to cut short an important Debate on questions of education was initiated by an hon. Member whose chief contribution to this very philosophical subject was to apply to those very decent men who carry the responsibility of Government the most unpleasant epithet of "robbers." We have heard of the robber council of Ephesus—a title given by history—but I do not think that even the whole of Walthamstow could pin the title of "robber" across the history of the present Government. I do not imagine that the cause of education, so dear to the hon. Member's heart, will be furthered by dropping into the Debate the very acid comment of lip service. Lip service is paid by rogues; lip service is paid by vagabonds, but lip service is never paid by honourable or honest men, and to suggest that the party which the last hon. Member represents is the one honest party and that his speech was the one honest speech, is surely a claim that can only be rewarded by making him, by universal acclamation, the one sole person
  1330
  fit to be Minister of Education in England. I gathered that the party that the hon. Member represents have a contribution to offer which we have not. I heard a statement made by one hon. Member that the Minister of Education speaks through his teeth and not with his heart. An hon. Member who can diagnose this anomaly with such ability is an hon. Member who has an inner fight denied to most. If he has had an education which enables him to possess an inner light so that he sees a discordance in function between what issues from the Minister's teeth and the movements of the Minister's heart, then lie has had an opportunity of education which the Minister and myself have missed.
  This Debate would be incomplete unless there were a chorus of thanks from every hon. Member to the teaching service. Whether it be in a country schools or in the still overcrowded frowsy atmosphere of our town schools, a life's vocation is being carried out. Perhaps the only false note struck in this Debate has been the suggestion that good education can be obtained in return for cash, and that if cash be not provided good education will not be provided in return. A good teacher is beyond price, but a dull "child-minder" should be excluded from the schools at any price we can afford to pay. The pouring out of unlimited money, which makes parents' hearts wither, will not produce either character, ability or good education. All those teachers who value their calling know that, and this is always expressed with full hearts when at old boys' associations, boys now grown to men, and girls grown to women, return thanks to those teachers who have put an indelible hall-mark on them. If this Committee recognises that, it will do something to encourage teachers in their vocation, and we shall be no party to the rather insulting suggestion that the more the money the better the teacher.
  There has been one happy note struck by the Government. They have never suggested that children and their education are simply a pawn in the problem of adult unemployment. That is a very happy note which was missing from the discussion on the last Education Vote. It is strange that so many hon. Members, particularly those before me, are convinced that the beginning and end of

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  education rests with the teachers. From the mother to the motor omnibus, education is going on. The motor omnibus tells you that if you are not spry the forces of gravity or of crushing weights will put an end to your existence. The newspapers are educating us daily, and even Members of this House from their party rostrums, at the street corners and in the market places are carrying on the same work of education, and to put the whole responsibility upon the shoulders of the teachers is false to nature, false to facts, and the teachers would be the first to disclaim it. But there is another form of cruelty. We have heard in the past of the cruelty, almost unbelievable, of children being confined to factories from their early years. Those who put this responsibility upon the teachers are guilty of equal inhumanity and cruelty. To force heavy studies upon children who are not cast in an academic mould, to force those who abhor Latin to go through the conjugations and verbs, and those who hate Greek to look at a lexicon; to force those who are artistic to try and grapple with geometry and algebra, may be a mental cruelty, as real as the cruelty, continued for so many years, which confined young children to our factories. It is hard to say whether or not the mental cruelty of ambitious parents is greater than the cruelty of poor parents who, unfortunately, had to send their children too early into industrial life.
  We have been asked: what need is there for economy in education. Surely a lesson which we have all learnt is that economy should be a note of personal and private life, and a note also of the administration of the country, because economy is a virtue and extravagance a vice. Education is not starved because we have a Minister who in handling these astronomical millions has the awful responsibility of trying to see that the poor harassed taxpayer gets the utmost value for the minimum expenditure. If economy be practised in the educational world it may do good if we realise that neither buildings nor directorates nor inspectorates necessarily help the cause of education. If it concentrates professional feelings amongst the teachers and makes them realise that they must stand more on their own legs, that no real help will come to them from those who con-
  1332
  sider themselves superior to educational work but born administrators, then good will be done.
  I hope the time will come when the teaching profession will be as conscious not only of its responsibilities but of its powers as my own profession. No one kicks harder than doctors at orders from Whitehall, and if only the teachers were inoculated with this mulish virus it would be better for education. A submissive educator can only produce a submissive people. We want a kicking people, a people who will always kick against oppression. It will be a good thing if teachers are freed from those eminent and amateur legal gentlemen who achieve high positions in the educational world by drawing subtle distinctions between what is a school building, what is a school place and what is a school playground, and making the administration of public money depend on spinning these subtleties which eventually occupy the attention of the highest courts of the land. If only that side of the work can be suppressed and teachers undertake the full responsibilities of their own profession then the few moneys still left at the disposal of the Minister may be used for the advancement of education and the advancement of teachers' salaries.
  Economy might be exercised with no educational disadvantage if the first year were cut out. The first year of education is largely that of creche work. I was touched by the speech of the hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. J. Jones), who said that many people have to bring up families in single rooms, and that, even if we extend school creches, we are not grappling with the problem of the slums. We are not making an educational advance when we conceal a slum. It would not be popular with the hardworking mother who likes to know that her child is safe and out of mischief, but that is no reason why the home work should be done by the expensive machinery of the Board of Education. We cannot undertake a review of our educational services without paying a tribute to the great work of the school medical officers and the efficient work of school nurses. But these are dreadful dead ends of professional life, and unless more openings are made by which the

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  keener members of these services can rise to better positions they will cease to attract the best of our nurses and the best of our doctors. For the best doctors and best nurses, though content with their pay, desire bigger fields for their energies and abilities than the school medical service affords.
  Let me throw out this idea for the consideration of the Committee, that we should not take pride either in the magnitude of our school clinics or in the number of our school doctors; they represent the extent of our borne failure. If we need many school nurses to insure that our children are free from ringworm and parasites and minor disorders it is evidence of a deficiency in the home work. In concentrating upon academic education in our elementary and secondary schools we are in danger of losing that valuable instinct which is suggested by the word "mothercraft." It would tend to make much of our school medical services unnecessary if our mothers had the instincts of the race and had better homes in which to bring up their children.
  It will not be altogether lamentable if a reduction in the grants from Whitehall lead to a greater independence on the part of local authorities. Independence is a characteristic feature of the English race and it is not necessarily good that local authorities should be so dependent on grants from Whitehall as to lose their freedom of thought and the initiation to start new advances in education. One does not like to think that directors of education have always one ear at the Whitehall telephone, nor does one like to think that the local school service is always anxious as to how it will impress the inspector from London. In any county there is a sufficient resource of common sense and experience to start exments in education, not necessarily subject to criticism from Whitehall, and if individuality comes to the fore from the foregoing of grants from Whitehall such economy is not necessarily harmful. I have received one and only one lamentable circular, and strangely enough it is from an association of head masters. It says:
  "The sense of injustice occasioned by this treatment is very intense and no matter how loyal the teachers may be it will unconsciously but surely re-act upon their
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  pupils. How can teachers teach that an Englishman's word is his bond with such an example from the Government? Besides, a worried teacher can never do the wholehearted work necessary to train England's future citizens."
  That letter to me is lamentable. How can a worried mother look after her children when she has all the worries of an impoverished household on her shoulders? She does it; and she does it brilliantly. How can a doctor, pressed by debt, save his patients life, put this interest in front of his own? He does it, and always will do, and we know that in the days of teaching poverty the teachers gave their whole hearts to those children whom parents entrusted to them. I think that this letter, well-intentioned though it may be, is nevertheless a most lamentable instance of zeal in office that does not represent facts in practice. Headmasters and men teachers will do their best, whatever be their grievances against any Government and whatever be their grievances or private worries.
  The hon. Member for Stourbridge (Mr. Morgan), who made a maiden speech, touched a high moral note that should be maintained in any discussion of education. We might properly say that, of all the parts of a school curriculum, religious instruction is by far the most important, as its subject matter, God's honour and service, includes the proper use of all man's faculties, and affords the most powerful inducements to their proper use. We must assume that religious instruction is a fundamental part of the school course. The teacher, while careful, in the presence of children of different religious beliefs, not to touch upon matters of controversy, should constantly inculcate, in connection with secular subjects, the practice of charity, justice, purity, patience, temperance, obedience to lawful authority, and all the moral virtues, but as the subject matter of religious instruction, the examination of it, and the supervision of its teaching are outside the competence of the department of education, no syllabus could be set forth.
  We were told by the hon. Member for Silvertown that education as he conceived it would offer a broad highway by which men might learn to redress their social inequalities and wrongs. Let us see what that means. It means that he, in fact, would tune the pulpits as Cromwell did

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  so, that the children of England might grow up to be aggressive and angular politicians, demanding always their rights and without any knowledge whatever of their duties. Can we conceive how happy would be the life of a teacher instructing young children how they should be young and active proletarian agitators? When the hon. Member had achieved his ends by the form of education known best to him, so that the whole of the children were anxious agitators for their rights, he, I am afraid, would of necessity become a ruler who would argue with nobody, because the crowd of trained agitators, who would then be the population of England, would be entirely unmanageable under any conceivable form of social organisation.
  There is one sad thing that I notice as I travel from school to school, and that is the gradual elimination of local interest and local control. Children belong to parents first of all; the State has an interest and the teachers have a professional interest in them, but that regulations should be so multiplied that school managers become nonentities is no sign of efficiency. My own profession is, by its very nature, expert. It owes its public trust to the fact that it is always responsible to the lay mind. We are always under the criticism of interested relations; we are always under the criticism of hospital committees. If teachers are to be shielded by educational organisation so that they stand behind the State, with a civil service between them and the parent, there will be an uprising of parental feeling that will be very unpleasant for those responsible for such organisation. I speak from knowledge when I say that managers of schools are being eliminated from all sense and feeling of power and of local interest. One hopes that one of the marks that the present Minister will leave upon our educational system will be a notable development of local interest and local management of the schools.
  8.30 p.m.
  If local education—if education at all—is to prosper, greater attention must be paid to the training schools. Whatever has been poured out on the schools themselves will be a waste of money, unless we provide brains as well as places. A true
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  professional training is achieved in training schools in which there is full professional freedom. I express the hope that the Minister will give the closest attention of his heart and mind to the universities and training schools, which are the mother and mistress of English education.
  Lastly, if there is anything that is going to destroy our modern civilisation, it is not Capitalism, Socialism or human perversity, but a general mass neurosis. If you watch carefully the writings of my own profession, you will gather we fear a development of mass neurosis, more than we fear the growth of cancer or consumption. If you look at the school records and the records of the school teachers you will find that nervous maladies predominate and reach a greater figure than in almost any other human occupation. If the teachers develop neurosis the pupils are bound to contract it. A study of the lower tone of the children in our elementary and secondary schools is most urgently called for.
  I will finish my short contribution to the most important Debate that I have listened to in this House, on the note, again, of thanks to the teachers. Owing to the inadequacy of parents we call in teachers' help. A parent should teach his child his religion. A parent in ideal circumstances is the best educator; but we parents fail. The State cannot control a man's religion, and should not control a man's education or his health, but the State can help all, and for the Minister's help to the parents and for the work that the teachers never cease to do, I most gladly record my thanks.
  Mr. ERNEST EVANS: I propose to confine myself in a very few sentences to trying to impress upon the representatives of the Board of Education the duty which I feel they ought to undertake in the very difficult time through which they, like all of us, are passing. I join with the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones) in saying that I do not think that the speech which has been made by the Minister of Education is the sort of speech that the Minister would really like to have made in presenting his first report, and I express my disappointment with it. There are certain things that the Board of Education can do in these difficult days, and

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  one is to guard against what the hon. Member who has just spoken called "mass neurosis." There is a mass neurosis which applies to the educational service. There are a large number of people who, as soon as they hear the word "economy" spoken, say: "Ah, let us get down to the Board of Education." They remind me of a young man who recently got engaged to be married. In order to celebrate the event, he presented the lady of his choice with an engagement ring, which was received with charm and even with rapture. She thanked him for it profusely, and she said: "What I like most about it is that in the ring are the stones of my particular choice, and none of the others ever did that for me." His reply was: "That's all right, my dear; that is the one I always use." So it is with regard to the speeches on economy that are delivered in this House or in the country. Education is the one subject that so many people always use.
  I appreciate the difficulties of the President of the Board of Education at the present time. I realise that there has been, naturally an arrest in much of the progress which some of us expected to see accomplished. There is, for instance, the question of extending the school age. Everybody has taken for granted the postponement of that policy but most people will regret in a few years time that it was not carried out because it was a far-reaching policy, affecting not only the education of the child but the moral of the nation and I think it would have made a greater contribution than most people imagine to employment. Therefore, the appeal which I make to the Board to-night is this: that if expenditure has to be curtailed, let excessive reaction also be curtailed.
  If some of the proposals which are now being made in different parts of the country are carried out it will take us a generation or two to get back to the position which we occupied before there was any talk of economy in the education services. The truth is that the need for economy, in this as in other services, is in danger of being used as an excuse for accomplishing purposes which are not essential to the scheme of economy provided for by the Government. Reference has already been made to a case which is known to many of us and which I hope will be notorious, the case of Salford
  1338
  where this plea of economy is being used, not to affect the sort of savings which I credit the Government with thinking were necessary, but to effect savings of quite a different kind. This has been done not by the education committee of the council but by the finance committee of the council which has used economy as an excuse for imposing those savings. In many other parts of the country the same sort of thing is being accomplished.
  We have heard about the size of classes. I have been interested to hear some of the complaints which have been made, as to the results of the education services of this country, by hon. Members who at the same time seem to be supporting the idea of economy even as applied to the size of classes. We do not advocate a reduction in the size of classes for the purpose of making the teachers' task easier. We advocate it for the very purpose which was mentioned by the hon. and gallant Member for North Portsmouth (Sir B. Falle) who referred to the number of children unable to read and write. The wonder is that so many children are able to read and write in view of the facilities which were provided in the past. Then there is the question of unsuitable buildings. I gathered from the manner in which the last speaker referred to the profession to which he belongs, that he must be a doctor because no other profession talks in that way about itself. Let him apply his mind to this phase of educational expenditure in which the need for economy is, I suggest, being exaggerated. If he has knowledge of public health and experience of work in health services as he probably has—[An HON. MEMBER: "A great deal!"] The more be has, the more he will agree with me in this statement—that the larger the number of insanitary buildings in which children have to be educated, the greater will be the bill which the country will have to meet in ill-health. These are matters which we mention not because we are fanatics in the cause of education as we have been described, but because they are matters which affect the lives of the children.
  There is another respect in which the excuse of economy is being unfairly used. We used to hear a great deal about the association of education and efficiency. We know that in recent economies a real threat is involved to the

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  work of our technical schools and continuation classes. The experience of the whole of Europe emphasises the great need for a continuation of technical education. It has greatly helped foreign countries and we must rely upon it, increasingly, as competition with foreign countries grows. The result of recent Measures taken in many parts of the country is, I am afraid, a considerable diminution of the interest taken in the education services. There is a diminution of the interest of the local education authorities, who had plans in mind, who had schemes and ideals which weighed with them, and for which they had been working. There is a diminution of the interest of parents who see their children deprived of opportunities for which they had been struggling. There is a diminution of interest on the part of the teachers, and in this connection I would, in one sentence, emphasise the eloquent appeal made by the hon. Lady the Member for East Islington (Miss Cazalet) in regard to the teachers. There is a great danger of a lack not only in numbers but quality of that supply of teachers which we need if the interests of future generations are to be safeguarded.
  Education we believe consists of two parts. The first is imparting knowledge to children, and to adults as well, because I am afraid that in the case of some adults it is just as necessary as in the case of children. But in addition to the imparting of information to students, whether they be children or adults, education consists also of drawing out the qualities possessed by the students. That is as important a feature of education as the first. People often fail to appreciate that fact, and when some hon. Members ask, "Can we afford what we are expending on the education services," I feel inclined to ask them in turn, "Can we afford to do otherwise with the world in the condition in which it is today?" For that reason, while appreciating the difficulties of the right hon. Gentleman the Minister and the Parliamentary Secretary, both of whom I know have their hearts in the right places, I beg the Government to bear these considerations in mind. I wish in the presence of the Committee to utter an emphatic protest against the action of
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  people who, when there is any talk of cuts in expenditure, immediately look to expenditure on education; and, with equal emphasis, I would remind them that the training of future generations of citizens of this country is one of the surest and safest economies which we can effect.
  Mr. PICKERING: I rise as one who believes that education is the most important service in the world and that the teacher is the most important person in the world, and though I must say, in the presence of the President of the Board of Education, "We find you not guilty," I also say, "Do not do it again." I do not very well see how, in the circumstances, the right hon. Gentleman could have avoided the economies. [An HON. MEMBER: "Why?"] Because we have not got ideal Ministers. We have a very good one in the present President of the Board of Education, but when we have the ideal President, he will resign or refuse to take office if there is a suggestion that education should not take first place in the country's regard. However, in the circumstances—and those circumstances include the people of this country—he has done his best. I am sorry to say that education is not valued as highly as it ought to be by the people of this country.
  I have met with much scepticism about education. When we talk of the crime wave, many people say, "It is due to your education." Education is on its trial, and very unfairly on its trial. For one thing, the ideal of education is much higher than it used to be, and therefore we demand a much higher standard of results from our children, and, secondly, the forces that are making against education are much stronger than they used to be. There is no doubt that the forces of commercialism and materialism have risen to a peak of power and that humanity is not yet strong enough to fight against them. We are not well enough educated, and the forces against education are so great that education often appears to fail. That does not mean that education is a failure, but that it is more and more necessary, if we are going to control these powers of commerce and materialism.
  There is one important thing that has been mentioned by several speakers, namely, that education is not merely a

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  matter of book-learning, but that it is largely a matter of the formation of character, of the drawing out and strengthening of ideals. I think this country stands alone among the nations of the world, or far worse than any other of the great countries, in having no national ideal of character to be formed by means of education. That ideal may be used in one way or another, and I will take two extremes of the present day—Russia and Japan. In one case, that of Russia, we have the ideal of Communism, and in Japan we have the ideal of Imperialism; and both those ideals are being wrought into the texture of the life of the country, by means of education. If we have an ideal for this country, we must do our best to bring out that ideal by means of our educational system. We say that it is difficult because we believe in liberty and that people should develop their own individuality. That is true, but our present failure to form character means that our children are all more or less alike, all wanting the same amusements, all reading the same type of newspaper. We have mass production going on, just because we have said that it is too difficult for us to set about forming character in our children.
  It has been done to a limited degree in our public schools, but it has not been democratic enough. We have not done it enough in our schools all over the country. One good thing that I will say about Japan is that in Japan the whole system of education is essentially democratic. We pride ourselves on being a democratic country, but the only schools here in which we have any education in forming character are the few public schools, not in the great mass of elementary and secondary schools. In Japan, in the elementary schools, all classes come together, and it is not a case of one school for the rich and another for the poor. All come to the same elementary school, and all receive the same kind of education. They lay great stress in Japan on teaching what we might call, very broadly, mariners or etiquette. If this were done in other countries, you would be taught how to behave according to your position in society, but in Japan the poorest labourer's child is taught etiquette and manners along with the daughter or son Of the governor of the prefecture or the
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  son or daughter of a nobleman. They are all taught together how to behave properly, and so you get an ideal which is widespread and forms a national character.
  I would suggest that our schools afford us a great opportunity of forming more than a national character—what we may call an international character. Through knowledge, we can make our children awake to the needs of the rest of the world and to their place in the community of nations. I do not think that any Englishman will quarrel with that idea of internationalism. In the schools, while they are young, children can be brought to realise that; and there would be less difficulty in dealing with the world's great crises than there is at the present time, if only our children were internationally educated. If we have the system of education that we ought to have, it will cost more and more. We never ought to hear of economies in education. The only time when we may hope for our education to cost us less is when our children and the public generally have been so well educated that there is so much wisdom and beauty in the homes that more work can be done in the homes and less in the schools. That time has yet to come, and until it does come we cannot reduce the cost of education.
  I would put in a special plea for the teacher. I was myself a teacher for a little time. Thank goodness, I had only a few months' experience of what it was like to be a teacher, and that convinced me that teaching is the hardest job that one can possibly undertake. I have worked with the Workers Educational Association, and I have learned that education is a thing greatly to be honoured. I have worked abroad as an educationist and have learned how important education can be. So I say that the teacher ought to be regarded as the most important person in this country. When one thinks of how little interest the public at large takes in education, one almost despairs for the future of education. It depends on the teacher. The teacher is the second creator of the child, and if you have poor teachers, you will get poor results in your children.
  I was talking the other day to a friend who is a senior classical master in a very important secondary school, and I believe that his salary, with cuts, is at present less than £500 a year. He is a most able

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  man. If he were in any other profession, he would get between £1,500 and £2,000 a year, and if he were in business, he might be making £5,000 a year, yet the utmost that he can hope for, unless he becomes a headmaster, is about £500 a year. Think of the many able teachers who are working for much less than that. It is a scandal that teachers should be so badly paid and that the public generally should laugh about it. Not only is the teacher's job the hardest, but the most important, and I hope that the President of the Board of Education will never again have to come forward and suggest economies. If he does, I for one will have to say, "This time you cannot be found not guilty." I hope that in future more and more money will be spent on education so that this country can be raised to greater heights.
  Mr. CHORLTON: The disappointing thing about this Debate is the small attendance of Members. When one realises, as has been said by other hon. Members, that education is one of the most important, if not the most important, consideration in life, it is disappointing to find so few people who take that point of view. I agree with other hon. Members that the Continental view of education is apparently quite different from ours. There they take a high opinion of education and attach a high value to it, and they value an educated man judging by the amount that they pay him. Those who hold the highest positions in industry on the Continent are usually those who have been the best educated in the technical sense. In such a time as the present, when economy is so necessary, we have to look at education from a rather different point of view from that to which we have been accustomed in the past. We should look at it from the point of view of quality rather than of quantity. We should in our plans lay stress upon provision for the particularly bright students, so that they will get additional help and an additional chance to carry their work through to the end. The training of their brains is, in fact, our insurance for the future. While it is not necessary, perhaps, to spend great sums upon training the mass of the country, it is essential to spend money on training the bright brains.
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  9.0 p.m.
  Reference was made by the Minister to the Czechoslovakian technical schools. That country, which is probably the most alert of the new countries, is turning out an extraordinarily large number of technically trained students. With a population of 13,000,000, they are turning out a greater number than France with four or five times the population. The reflection naturally arises: Can Czechoslovakia make use of these students? The numbers seem to be disproportionate to the size of the population and the industries of the country, and it seems as though it would not be possible to find berths for them after training. It is one of the great disappointments of life to find the large number of highly-trained men who are poorly paid and the large number who are out of a job. I am afraid that this country, unless the students emigrate, will ultimately find that it has a huge class which will get little more than workmen's wages. The conclusion to which one is driven is that we must specialise still more on quality as against quantity. Germany is the highest technically trained country in the world; it is a generation before us, and the technical training is intensive to a degree. We find that the quality side is greatly developed, and in the technical high schools the research equipment and laboratories are very wonderful, and some remarkable work is carried on in them. Much as I believe in education, I believe in the specialised side of research. Research is the greatest and best insurance that we have for the future, and it is false economy not to spend all that can be wisely spent in that direction. I admire those universities or technical schools in Germany where the research side is so well developed, and I suggest that the Minister should consider making provision to send schoolmasters from this side to Germany much more often than is done now in order that they may see what is going on and take advantage of it. We cannot afford to stay at home in days like this. I spend a good deal of every year abroad, and it is my experience that on every occasion I pick up something which I failed to find here. When so many of our well-trained men have not the means to avail themselves of this chance, it ought to be part of the Minister's care for them to provide the means so that they can go not only to

  1345
  Germany, but to countries like America, where technical training and research work are carried to an abnormal extent.
  With all this, we must have a practical side to education. We must think of what is to happen to the student when he leaves school or a university like Cambridge, and endeavour to find an appointment for him. It is the duty of the Board to find places for students when they have finished their training. Nothing is so disappointing to a young fellow who has spent years in intensive training to find, when he has finished, that he cannot get a job. We must therefore relate technical training more closely to industry. We must bring the industrial leaders more closely into touch with the technical colleges. They must take a part in them and be part of the organisation. They must work closely together, for it is only by team work that success will be achieved in this direction. I believe in technical training being carried out to the greatest extent that we can afford; we should vary our methods in order to work for quality rather than quantity; and we should provide still greater means for research than we have done, and see that research laboratories are connected with industry more actively than they are now. It must not be said or felt that there is a lack of close connection between research and industry. Apart from the measures which have been taken by this House to improve technical training, there still remains the question of how our best brains are to be used in research to open up discoveries in many directions. If we all work together with that object in front of us we shall achieve our ends more certainly than will any other nation.
  Mr. COCKS: The hon. Member for Platting (Mr. Chorlton) expressed his disappointment with the paucity of the attendance during this Debate on education. I am not at all disappointed, because I expected it. We have a National Government returned as a result of an appeal based on the effect of fear on ignorance, and its supporters cannot be expected to have any interest in education at all.
  Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE: Like the Opposition.
  Mr. COCKS: The numbers of the Opposition here are about ten to one as
  1346
  compared with the supporters of the National Government.
  Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE: About 8 per cent. of your party are here.
  Mr. COCKS: Well, the hon. Member's mathematics are not mine.
  Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE: There are seven out of fifty-four.
  Mr. COCKS: If the hon. and gallant Member were to analyse the attendance of his party, I think he would find the position to be very much worse. At any rate, those of us who are here are interested in education, whilst hon. Members opposite are here to support a Minister who has introduced a, reduction into his Education Estimates. The policy of the Government is not based on a yellow book or a blue book or a pink book, but based simply upon the golden book of Mammon, sometimes known as the May Report. If I remember aright, that report stated that not only was too much money being spent upon education, but that the children of the workers were being educated too highly. The people who are behind the Government do not want the children of the workers to be educated beyond a certain level, enough to make them efficient wage slaves. They do not want a, really educated people, because they know perfectly well that if once we got a thoroughly well-educated people in this country there would be an end to the economic and social evils which we have endured for too long.
  That is why the Government have adopted the policy of cutting down the number of teachers, and leaving the classes of children so large that they cannot possibly be educated by the teachers. Everyone who has been to a public school knows that the limit of a class there is 30 pupils, if not fewer—at any rate that was about the number of boys in my form. Elementary schools now have classes with 60 children and. more, and when a teacher was asked by an inspector some time ago what she was teaching her children, she replied, "I am not teaching them anything; I am earning my money if I can keep them from breaking up the furniture." That is the sort of thing the present Government are perpetuating and increasing. Not only have they stopped the process of reducing the numbers in a class, but they are perpetuating a system under which schools condemned long ago as

  1347
  absolutely unfit for children, to be educated in are still being used. In Nottingham, for example, as a result of the policy suggested by the Government, the local education authority have reduced their education programme, including the reconstruction of schools, by no less than £121,539; and the same thing is happening throughout the land. I have here a whole list of reductions and so-called economies, and the example. I have given is not the smallest.
  The hon. Member for West Leicester (Mr. Pickering) made a very pleasant speech just now, but I was rather alarmed about his future, because I could see from his speech that the differences on policy in the National Government are not now confined to the Cabinet, but are spreading among the supporters of the Government. He actually threatened the Minister of Education that if he dared to bring in Estimates of a similar kind next year he might be forced to vote against him. He told us that in Japan there is a system of education in which all children go to the same school—the children of the workers and capitalists alike. We should like to see that system introduced into this country. It would be a very good thing for the children of all people, the miners and the mine-owners, the millionaires and the workers, to have to go through the same schools and sit side by side in the same classes. Then we should get rid of the terrible social snobbery which divides one class from another and is a very bad thing for the country.
  The people behind this Government dislike education because it is worse than a bomb to the present social system—much more permanent in its destructive effect. But if they are thinking of the future of the country they are mistaken in making cuts in education. If our wealth is to increase and our industry is to develop—I doubt whether it will under the present system—however wealthy we may be our greatness will be of a very impermanent character unless it is built on the foundation of a well educated people. In these great storms which are upon us we shall be left, as Matthew Arnold said:
  "As on a darkling plain
  Swept by confused alarms of struggle and flight
  Where ignorant armies clash by night."
  1348
  We do not want ignorant armies or an ignorant people in this country. We want to have education going right through the whole social system, so that children from the poorer schools shall be able to work up from the elementary schools to the secondary schools and go on to the universities. When we on this side are in power we shall see that that is done and then we shall not have an electorate swept away by a bogus currency crisis, but a people that will stand foursquare to all the winds that blow.
  Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE: The hon. Member for Broxtowe (Mr. Cocks) is a little bit mistaken in his estimate of the interest which we on this side take in education. So convinced are we that the National Government and the Minister of Education are right in their estimates that we do not find it necessary to be hero to say what we feel on the subject or to refute what is said by the Opposition. If the Opposition have a real point of attack against the Government they assemble in force and the fact that only one out of six of their Members have been present during the past hour shows that they do not feel that there is any substance in the criticism they are making against the Estimates. The hon. Member for Broxtowe said that on the Government side of the House we were not interested in education, but we contend that the more educated the people are the fewer will be those in the ranks of the Labour party. We believe that the more the people are educated the better it will be for the country, and therefore, on that point, the hon. Member for Broxtowe and myself are agreed.
  We have heard a good deal about the advantages of education, but I am afraid a good deal of what is said is somewhat hollow. The general statement that money poured out like water on education is the right policy carries us no further. The hon. Member for West Leicester (Mr. Pickering) told us that education was the highest thing in the world, but I have always been taught that that applies more to faith, hope and charity, and education ought to deal with all those points. The hon. Member for Mile End (Dr. O'Donovan) emphasised the point that the medical profession are not simply looking after the health of the children, but that the education of

  1349
  the spirit has been the guiding line for the individual, while the body is merely the machine through which the spirit is able to take effect. We want education in the wider sense. We are responsible for the education of the body and the mind, and we want to educate children in such a way as will lead to the development of the right spirit.
  The hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. J. Jones) used to gibe which requires a, little analysis. He said that hon. Members supporting the Government believed more in the waving of the Union Jack than in education. We believe that as long as infants are taught to wave the Union Jack that is sufficient, but the hon. Member for Silvertown, with his usual sense of humour, exaggerated that point. The hon. Member for West Leicester semed to think that the one real line on which education should proceed was international and not national, but I think that is wrong. The international idea is perhaps the greatest in the world, but you can only lead up to the international through the national, and to the national through the local. The proper ideal is to make little mention to children of internationalism, because that will come to them if they are taught in the proper spirit. You have to imbue the child with a sense of loyalty. First of all, comes loyalty to the family, and that is very important. We want family authority, and a child should be taught to be loyal to its surroundings. In the average village or town loyalty is essential to the different societies to which the child belongs. The waving of the Union Jack is quite right if it is used in a right sense. Internationalism means nothing to a child's mind, and in my view it is out of place in an education Debate.
  There is one particular point on the more technical side, and it is something about which I am naturally more concerned. As an old medical officer of health, I am particularly concerned with the health side of education, both mental and preventive. The hon. Member for Mile End, in regard to crime, said that the medical side was important in relation to the inspection and rectification of defects in the children. There are two particular sets of people engaged in education who are responsible for the preventive side—one is the teacher and the
  1350
  other is the parent. We have done everything we can to interest those two sets of people. The teachers have a great responsibility in this matter, and I wish to pay my tribute to the way the teachers responded in the early days of medical inspection, and helped not simply with the uninteresting work of the medical side and sanitation of the schools, but in trying to inculcate a proper knowledge of prevention in the children themselves. That is a great responsibility. What is more important is the development of family health.
  Attempts have also been made to develop the relationship between the schools and the mothers. In my view, the home and the school are too much divorced. Many parents send their children off to school, and when they come back the mothers know nothing of what goes on in the school, and the teachers know nothing of what goes on in the home. It is difficult to get any association in these matters. In a country village very often the teachers know the parents and visit them in their homes, and there is a good deal of association between the two. That is impossible in a large town, but I think we ought to extend that relationship in some way. In the country we used to invite the parents to the inspection of the school children, and that is being done now to a considerable extent in the towns. There are prize days to which the parents are invited, and the more parents can be associated with school work the better. In some schools there are occasions an which the parents can meet the children, and the discussions which take place on different problems at those meetings will help the parents to fulfil their part, and it will help the teachers as well. Until this suggestion can be carried out more fully we are not getting proper education for the children.
  The mental side is liable to be forgotten in considering the health of school children. The other day we had an interesting discussion on the Home Office Estimates on this question, and I put in a plea for the better coordination of the work in connection with crime between the Home Office, the Board of Control and the Board of Education in studying the whole question of mentality. It is useless for one Department to be con-

  1351
  sidering its own side of the problem. It is necessary that all the different sides should be considered. The question of the school for mentally defective children has to be associated with the mental hospitals and the work of mental treatment under the Board of Control. The work of the Ministry of Health comes in with it, and the work of the Home Office as well.
  It is useless for us to be considering simply the crimes unless the making and breeding of crime in its earlier stages is also considered. That is what I am thinking of in connection with this mental and health work in the schools. Just as we talk superficially of research on education, so we talk rather superficially of research in this matter. Research means the use of all the different avenues to the knowledge of any particular subject. You have to look into the causes of the growing neurosis in the population of which we have heard this evening. We have got the birth-rate down to a very small figure, the death-rate reduced to a minimum and the infant mortality rate perhaps down to the lowest point, but we have a generation grievously afflicted with nervous maladies. We have to consider what are the causes, and one of the chief causes is the appetite of the children for an unnatural amount of movement and activity. A great deal of it is natural, and it is difficult to know where to stop. You have to give the children themselves the seeds of a love of quiet which may afterwards be a valuable influence in order that they may try and resist the tendencies which make for neurotic troubles.
  I do hope we shall see in this kind of thing a greater co-operation between the different Departments of State. When we have definitely got a result which is so prominent before us as juvenile crime, the causes of which we ought to be discussing to-day, we must link the two things together. You can only do that by having some superior combination. I do not know what it should be—whether it should be built up upon the Committee of Research set up some time ago, which is out of the reach of this House altogether, and which was formed in the inner circle of the Cabinet, or whether it should be a special committee under the Privy Council. Whatever form it takes,
  1352
  you do want somebody to co-ordinate these subjects without interfering in the work of administration with which the Board of Education is fully occupied. I do hope we shall consider this thing as one of the main future problems with which we are concerned at the present time.
  9.30 p.m.
  I can see no signs of the health side of education being in any way deteriorated by the present economies. There have been cheap allusions to economy as if in itself it must be a cutting down, retrenchment, and backward step. Some speeches recently made, even by those who should have known better, have suggested on the other hand that we always known enough and can very often make some economies which will not do us harm. We must and can make economies at the present time, and, although they mean hardship to many teachers—for which I am very sorry myself—I do not think the education side is suffering at all, and I hope that side will be continued to the credit not only to the local authorities but to the teachers themselves. I trust that as long as the country requires this saving of expense that work will continue and that we shall continue to get the efficient service which is still being carried out by the splendid educational system of this country.
  Mr. COVE: The Debate has been characterised by the sparse attendance of members, by some excellent maiden speeches and by the somewhat disquieting speech of the President of the Board of Education. The sparse attendance, which is a disquieting factor, seems to indicate that the Members who are behind the Government must be satisfied that the President of the Board of Education is carrying out the wishes of the majority of those who form the supporters of the National Government. The majority is not composed of members of the same political party or the same political affinities as the right hon. Gentleman. The majority is composed of a party that is quite opposed to the party to which he belongs. I should imagine that had the majority of the Members of the National party been dissatisfied with the economies of the President, we should have had them here in great numbers to-night, pressing on him still further

  1353
  economies above those already effected. The maiden speeches which we have heard have been very much nearer the realities of education than the general Debate. The speech of the President was disquieting to some degree, and I would like the Parliamentary Secretary, who is going to reply, to try to remove that disquiet and to assure us that our feelings of anxiety have no foundation in fact.
  For instance, I am not quite sure whether the President is a friend or an enemy of the teaching profession. I felt to-night that, perhaps, he was trying to be a friend, but I was not quite reassured in my own mind that he was really a friend, because the picture he painted was one in which the English teacher was better off than any teacher in Europe in regard to his salary and his pension, that he had greater security than any other people and that, in fact, he—and "he" includes "she"—was a person who should be very well satisfied. I think he left out of consideration a good many disabilities as far as the teaching profession is concerned. He forgot to mention that if you are going to compare teachers' salaries you must not leave out of account the fact that the average salary prior to the War was round about about 36s. per week, nor the fact that, deliberately and by resolution, the organisation representing those teachers told the rank and file throughout the country that in the emergency of the War they must not press for an increase in salary. He forgot to mention that his predecessor, Mr. Fisher, when he considered the whole situation, came to the definite conclusion that teachers were grossly underpaid, and that that was bad for the profession, and the Fisher formula, which included the 60 per cent. grant for teachers' salaries, was arrived at in order to attract entrants of a good quality into the teaching profession.
  I am prepared, and I believe that the teaching profession is prepared, to let the curtain drop, as it were, on the 10 per cent. cut—to regard it as a contribution to the national emergency. The teaching profession, and the National Union of Teachers as voicing the opinions of the profession, are prepared to agree that that 10 per cent. cut was imposed on teachers because of the national emergency, and to let it pass;
  1354
  but the question which the profession are asking, and which the President of the Board of Education himself asked, is: What of the future? If the President of the Board and his Parliamentary Secretary have been watching, as I am sure they have, the tendency in the ranks of the teaching profession during the last few months, they will have observed that teachers have become much more politically minded and politically active than they have ever been. They have been driven to politics because of that cut. They have said that it was imposed on the political field by political agencies, and that the only method of alleviation is by exercising the maximum political power that they possess.
  That political tendency has been thrust upon teachers by the necessities of the conditions in which they find themselves. It is not a tendency which they like, or to which they would naturally bend their thoughts and activities. For the past 10 years or so, the National Union of Teachers, clearly and definitely, as far as regards material benefits to teachers, has been drifting away from what I would describe in general terms as political action, and has been relying upon negotiation and conciliation through a body and structure erected at the express invitation of the Government of the day, namely, the Burnham Committee. That committee was set up as a negotiating and conciliating body, on which the various sides were represented. It was, if I may correct an impression which appears to exist, a body which, far from not being controlled by the Government of the day, was a body whose decisions and findings had to be accepted by the Board of Education, presumably by the Treasury, and generally by the Government in power at the time. It is a body of which both the authorities who are the direct employers of the teachers and the teachers themselves have been justly proud, whose work in regard to conciliation and arbitration has been eminently successful, and whose awards have brought peace and satisfaction and quietude to the whole of the teaching profession. The teachers are now asking the President of the Board of Education, and I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will be able to satisfy us on this point: Is it the deliberate policy of

  1355
  the Board of Education that this conciliatory body shall function freely and truly in future so far as the remuneration of teachers is concerned?
  I am not pleading to-night for a restoration of the 10 per cent. cut; I am not expecting the Parliamentary Secretary to say that the Board will either restore a part or the whole of the 10 per cent. cut; but I wonder whether he could not tell us that what was said in the crisis is in fact and in spirit true, namely, that the 10 per cent. cut and the alteration of the Fisher formula was an emergency imposition due to the crisis, that it was not a permanent cut, that it is the deliberate policy of the Board of Education in the future that the alteration of the formula and the stranglehold which is put upon the Burnham Committee will be removed, that free negotiations will take place, and that conditions will be assembled whereby the Burnham Committee, representing the authorities, the teachers, and the overriding power of the Treasury, shall have freedom to arrive at fair remuneration for the teachers in the schools of this country That is all that we ask.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: I do not think that the hon. Member can have heard what I said in my opening statement. I would refer him to the answer which I gave in September, and which was repeated here to-day. It was most clear.
  Mr. COVE: I must confess that I am not clear yet. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman would help this Committee and the teachers throughout the country if he would not merely say that he has given a clear answer, but would he tell us exactly what that statement is?
  Sir D. MACLEAN: That point will be dealt with by the Parliamentary Secretary.
  Mr. COVE: The right hon. Gentleman has suggested that I had not heard his speech, but I can assure him that I did hear it, and was much interested in it and noted it carefully. It would be a good thing if he himself, as the responsible Minister, were to state categorically and clearly what is the position of the Board of Education in this matter. Is he prepared to assemble the conditions which will allow the Burnham Committee
  1356
  to operate freely, and to operate forthwith, and to arrive at a fair remuneration for teachers? This is a matter of first-class importance, and, if he is prepared to answer that, I am prepared to sit down, because his statement is much more important than mine and will be read with much more interest by all those who are engaged in education on the administrative and teaching side. All I want is freedom for the Burnham Committee to operate. I want the Burnham Committee to have an opportunity to do what the right hon. Gentleman himself said ought to be done, and that is to consider the remuneration of the teachers on its merits. Is he prepared now to state categorically that the Burnham Committee shall work under such conditions as to allow the remuneration of teachers to be considered on its merits?
  I was very interested also in his description of the general work of the Department. There is not a Member who heard his speech who can say that it was an analysis of the Estimates that he presented. We heard of milk at a 1d. a bottle, for which the parents pay. We heard of the Carnegie Trust pouring American money into the country. One would have thought, instead of it being a matter of pride, instead of it being something that one could have glorified over, there was some little amount of shame in the fact that we had to rely upon American money in the development of certain phases of education. The right hon. Gentleman talked of gigantic increases in the cost of education. I believe he went back even to 1906. You cannot come to any reasonable judgment on the increase in the cost of education unless you relate it to increases in the cost of other Services and to the proportion of the national income that it took prior to and after the War. I thought the right hon. Gentleman was at great pains to show that he had out-Heroded even the May Report as far as economies were concerned. When it comes to expansion in the Social Services, it is always related to pre-War figures, but, when it comes to expansion in Debt Services and the Navy and Army Services, there is always a tendency, not to go back before the War, but to compare the figures with post-War years. Let me put education in its national setting. I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will listen carefully to

  1357
  this and see whether he has a reply to it. I take the May Report. I do not take the anti-social, class-ridden majority report, because I hope—though I am beginning to be very doubtful about it, as are many others—he is not accepting the philosophy of the majority report, which says that we must cut down elementary and secondary education for the workers' children because they are now getting a better education than is being received by middle-class children.
  I am puzzled by the right hon. Gentleman. A year or two ago he moved a Resolution, not pleading, but definitely stating that the school-leaving age should be raised. He said the future of our citizens and the future of the industrial life of the nation depended upon the development of education. The curious thing about it is that he was also the Mover of the Resolution which set up the May Committee and he seemed enthusiastic not merely in carrying out the recommendations of the May Committee but even in outdoing them. Let us put the figures into some setting. As I understood him, the cost of education mounted higher and higher. There was a gigantic increase, and he was proud of it. I turn to the minority section of the May Report—obviously, figures drawn up by experts in the Civil Service. I find, first of all, that the increase of budgetary expenditure from 1913–14 to 1930–31 amounted to £633,333,000; in brief, that there was an increase of expenditure through the Budget over pre-War of no less than £633,000,000. Admittedly, that is a gigantic increase. There is a tremendous step forward in expenditure. But the minority of the May Committee analyses that increase, and I beg the right hon. Gentleman to have some regard to it in his administration. What are the factors making up that increase? In 1913–14 the War Debt and Sinking Fund amounted to £24,000,000. In 1931–32 the War Debt and Sinking Fund amounted to £354,000,000. Analyse it by percentages, and it means that the increase of post-War expenditure over pre-War runs in this way: 60 per cent. of that increase is due to War debts and the management of War debts; 17 per cent, of it is due to an increase in the expenditure on the Social Services; 6 per cent. alone is due to the increase of expenditure upon education. There you have the relative expenditures over
  1358
  the pre-War period: 60 per cent. or more due to the Debt on War Services, 17 per cent. due to Social Services and 6 per cent. due to Education.
  Can it be said, if economy is needed, that education should come first for cutting dawn? If there is to be economy, or what the phrase in the May Report continually says, namely, if fair relativities are to be the principle of economy, then, surely, that 60 per cent. ought to suffer the major decrease before you touch the expenditure upon education. Look at it in another way. Let us relate expenditure and education to the national income. Here, again, I have only to go to the Minority Report of the May Committee. In 1913–14 the budgetary expenditure of this country amounted to only 7.4 of the national income. In 1929–1930, the budgetary expenditure had increased from 7.4 to 18.93 of the national income, that is, there was an increase of just over 11 per cent. Let me examine how that increase is made up. Debt interest, 7 per cent.—I am leaving out the decimal point—Sinking Fund for the debt.87 per cent., War pensions 1.36, and social services 1.41. Broadly speaking, therefore, 9 per cent. out of the 11 per cent. of the increase absorbed of the national income is due to war and the causes of war. Nine per cent. of it is absorbed by debt interest and debt charges. Practically 2 per cent. of it is absorbed by social services, and out of that 2 per cent. only.46 per cent. is absorbed by the service of education. I do not think, having regard to those facts, that it is fair, right or proper that education should suffer the axe of economy to the drastic degree it is undoubtedly suffering at the present time.
  10.0 p.m.
  Let me take another set of figures, again from the Minority Report of the May Committee—the distribution bf Government expenditure. It is analysed from many angles in the Minority Report of the May Committee, and it would he a very useful thing if we could make the people study the Minority Report. The War Debt in 1913–14 absorbed 9.94 per cent. and in 1931–32 it absorbed 37.71 per cent. The social services in 1913–14 absorbed 8.56 per cent. and in 1931–32 14.25 per cent. Education grants in 1913–14 absorbed 9.7 per cent. and in 1931–32 7.06 per cent., a decrease, as far

  1359
  as education itself is concerned. I will give the Parliamentary Secretary plenty of time in which to reply. I should like him to relate the economies which are undoubtedly embodied in the Estimates to that national situation. I should like him to consider, not merely the post-War increases in a detached way, but to apply the principle of fair relativity as far as the Civil Services are concerned. I am certain that if he will do that, he will realise that the burden, as far as taxation in this country is concerned, is not the burden of the social services. If taxation is breaking the back of British industry—I said the other night that I disputed it, and I still dispute it—it is not the taxation which is levied for the purpose of education, and it is not the taxation levied for the purpose of social services. If taxation is breaking the back of British industry, it is the taxation which is levied for the purpose of paying the interest on the War Debt and the War Loan. If there is to be fair treatment of the problem the Government of the day, including the President of the Board of Education, cannot give that treatment unless they direct their attention towards this end. What is embodied in these Estimates? Stagnation! But one would think, after listening to the President of the Board of Education and some of the other speakers, that stagnation is not reaction.
  One speaker said that he could not presume to have all the detailed knowledge of the Board of Education, but I have here a long list of what is happening all over the country. I find that local authorities are considering their education estimates. What is being done? A suggestion for a nursery school—cut it out. A suggestion for a new building—cut it out. A suggestion for free places or an extension of free places—cut it out. A suggestion for development as far as this part and the other part of the education service is concerned—cut it out. The impression obtained by a study of what is happening up and down the country is not merely that we are standing still and taking stock. It is not merely that education authorities and the Board of Education are sitting up and saying, "Let us see in what direction we shall go." They are sitting up and say-
  1360
  ing, "Where can we cut down? Cut down all free places. Cut down the secondary provisions. Cut down all the movements towards reducing the size of classes. Cut here, cut there and cut everywhere as far as the education services are concerned." The President of the Board of Education very astutely, but none the less disquietingly, took our attention in the direction of technical and practical education. Will the President of the Board of Education, or the Parliamentary Secretary say, "I am convinced that the right direction and the right bias for education in this country is towards technical and practical education, and that we on behalf of the Board of Education will see to it that there is a great expansion in practical and technical education"? Will either of them dare to get up and say that? They must know that a practical education, a technical education and the bias for practical and technical education is much more costly than what is called a bookish and literary education. The Board of Education dare not, in their responsibility to-night, unless they are going to break through the irons of economy, say that.
  I am very pleased with the Parliamentary Secretary in many respects in connection with his work at the Board. He takes a great interest in it, and many people have been pleased with the interest he has taken in it. They realise that they have a jolly good man as Parliamentary Secretary. I am not so doubtful about him as I am about the President of the Board of Education. I am much more convinced that the Parliamentary Secretary is straining to develop the education system than I am about the President of the Board of Education. I have much more anxiety about the President who, I believe, is causing much more anxiety through the ranks of the educational world than is the Parliamentary Secretary. The Parliamentary Secretary has been talking about practical education and the technical bias. Will he say to-night that the policy of the Government is and will be to expand and extend practical education? Will he say that all the facilities that are necessary will be provided and that all the conditions that are required will be put into operation, so that the children shall have all the requisites for practical education? Will he say that all the provisions for technical education will be

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  forthcoming? If he will, I shall be much surprised, because practical and technical education is expensive. This nation will need expansion along those lines but I am afraid that this Government will not meet the needs of the situation.
  To sum up, these Estimates mean stagnation and mark reaction. You cannot stand still in the educational world any more than you can stand still in the business world. You have to go forward or you must inevitably go backward. These Estimates mean going back. Will the Parliamentary Secretary answer this question? Has the President of the Board of Education gone back on his word so far as the employment of teachers is concerned? We understood that he would see to it that as far as possible there should be no unemployed teachers but, as I understood him to-night, and others have understood him, he means that if a local authority, under the conditions of financial stringency, press for larger classes, which means more unemployed teachers, the weight of the Board of Education will not be used on the side of smaller classes.I should like a definite assurance upon that point. I should like to know whether the beneficent influence of the Board will be used to see that the teachers who were invited into the training colleges at the express invitation of the Government will not be thrown on the scrap heap of unemployment when they leave the colleges.
  I am not satisfied with the Estimates. This country will have to say that it is in the interests of the nation and in the interests of the individuals that an increasing amount of education shall be at the disposal of our people, that there can be no equality of opportunity, that there can be no democratic Government and no fair play in the present industrial society unless the poor lad, equally with the lad of parents who are well-to-do, has free, full access to a full and free secondary education. Hon. Members opposite do not ask, "Is my child at the age of 13 fit to profit by secondary education?" The President of the Board of Education would not ask that about his own children, any more than I do about mine. What we say is, that it is natural that children at the age of 13 and 14 should go on to secondary education; secondary education not of one particular type but of a varied type, that secondary education
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  is a normal requirement of normal children, and that it is a provision to meet normality. That is the position of the Labour party and it is the position which I am proud to proclaim to-night on behalf of the party which I represent.
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Ramsbotham): The hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove) made such kind and charming remarks about myself that if I could relieve his feelings of anxiety I naturally should do so. Unfortunately, to do so might involve me in filling the role of prophet and I should be much more competent to do that the day after to-morrow than I am to-day. He asked my right hon. Friend to state the view which he expressed a short while ago on the question of the reduction in teachers' salaries and with the Committee's permission I will read an extract from what my right hon. Friend said. Speaking in this House last September my right hon. Friend said:
  "The reduction in teachers' salaries is occasioned by the national emergency, and is not to be regarded as the view of the Government of what should be proper rates of remuneration of teachers under less abnormal conditions. The position should be reviewed on its merits when the financial position of the country allows."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th September, 1931; cols. 1006–7, Vol. 256.]
  I do not think the Committee can expect me to add anything to that statement. As regards the position of the Burnham Committee, the position is the same to-day as it has been under preceding Governments. There is no change in its function and there is no desire that there should be a change. There is no difference in policy whatsoever. The Burnham Committee consists of two panels, one from the local education authorities and the other from the teachers, presided over by an impartial chairman. They make recommendations after agreement. Those recommendations come before the Government. In the past they have been accepted, and I hope they will be accepted in the future, but no Government responsible for the finances of the country can abrogate its position or avoid having the overriding power to accept the recommendations or otherwise.
  We have had a long and very interesting Debate with some valuable criticisms and suggestions. We do not in the least

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  complain of criticism. Criticism is good for the political health of a Minister just as salt is good for his physical health; and it is in that spirit that the criticisms have been received. Before dealing with the various points that have been raised, may I thank my right hon. Friend for the generous reference he made to me at the commencement of the Debate? If I may say, with all modesty, a subordinate is what his chief makes him, and I can say that educationally we have not yet agreed to differ and I hope we never shall. The hon. Member for St. Helens (Captain Spencer) in a very admirable maiden speech raised the question of examinations, and the same point was touched upon by the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Goldie) in another excellent maiden speech. They will both find me sympathetic because I am very much in the position of an examinee; and I recollect that when I used to sit for an examination and there were a number of questions on the paper, the advice given me was "do not attempt to answer too many; answer a few as well as you can." With the permission of the Committee I shall endeavour to follow the advice given me many years ago.
  The question of examinations is a rather difficult subject and at the moment the secondary schools examination council is considering the whole position and I hope before long they will come to some conclusions and then the Committee will have the advantage of reading their report. The hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones) raised the question of capital expenditure, and drew attention to the memorandum issued by the Board of Education on the Estimates. He pointed out that the expenditure in 1931 from April to September was over £5,000,000 and from September to December of that year a comparatively small sum. He also pointed out that in 1930 the expenditure was over £9,000,000; much in excess of previous years, and that this enormous expenditure seems to have created extreme fright amongst educational administrators. It created fright amongst those who were responsible in 1931, because the President of the Board of Education in that year, Mr. Lees-Smith, speaking on the 16th July, 1931, said:
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  "I have no doubt that a good many proposals will be made to-day for further educational improvements. I doubt whether there is any one of them with which I shall not myself agree. But I must point out that I am now constrained by financial difficulties, and by more than financial difficulty—by financial perils which affect every country in the world. The ultimate hopes of many may have to be postponed."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 16th July, 1931; col. 820, Vol. 265.]
  There must have been fright in the mind of the late President of the Board of Education when he uttered those words, and the position to-day is very much the same. That was the writing on the wall, when hon. Members opposite were enjoying their banquet, their educational repast. I do not grudge them that; indeed I look with some envy on those spacious, halcyon days which they enjoyed as educational administrators, when questions of finance and economy were in abeyance. The hon. Member for Caerphilly dealt with the question of secondary schools in certain rural areas and the fees, which he said were very high. He might have remembered that there are free places in rural areas just as there are in urban areas and if the Committee will turn to the memorandum they will see some interesting figures as to the free places in secondary schools in rural and urban districts. For instance, the total secondary school population on the 1st October, 1931, was 439,000, and 224,000 of them paid fees and 215,000 did not. That is, that nearly 50 per cent. of the secondary school population did not pay fees; which is very satisfactory.
  Read the comparative figures of the preceding table. They show an increase from 177,000 in the preceding year, and, going back to 1920, they are more than double. As regards the amount of fees, the Committee perhaps does not realise what secondary education costs. Including the amount attributable to loan charges on the buildings of the secondary schools, the average cost to a local education authority of a pupil attending a secondary school is about £34, and the receipts in the way of fees average nearly £7. Those who go to the secondary school with free places, get an education of the value of £34, and those who pay fees get an education considerably in excess, as measured in money, of the fees that they pay. On the whole that posi-

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  tion is not unsatisfactory. The hon. Member said that he required secondary education for all, and he held the view strongly. I shall deal with the question later on, but I want to say that we are building intentionally a parallel system of secondary education. I hope to develop that point a little later, but it is one which I mention now, because it comes in the order of his argument. He mentioned the case of Salford. All I can say is that, in diplomatic language, conversations are still proceeding, and as regards Bristol I understand that the situation is very much more satisfactory and causes much less anxiety. The policy of reorganisation stands, and we are keeping to the Hadow Report. We shall go on until the reorganisation is complete throughout the country.
  The hon. Member then mentioned technical education. I want to detain the Committee for a short time on that subject, because it refers to what I believe to be the most important feature of educational administration, and that is the relation of our system of education to industry and commerce. I am not in the least afraid, nor I think is the Committee, of the criticism that our education is too vocational. It is more likely that it is not vocational enough. All education is vocational, and it always must be, if it is to be worth its salt. There is far more danger that we shall educate our children in a vacuum from which all the industrial and commercial air has been exhausted. There are cases in which there is a more or less rarified atmosphere that would be none the worse for a good dose of vocational oxygen. In some of the rural areas it would be a good thing if more of the pens were beaten into ploughshares and pruning hooks. The main question is how far does our present system of education fit pupils for their occupations? Between 500,000 and 600,000 boys and girls complete their education every year and the vast majority of them go into either commercial or industrial occupations. These boys and girls are the problem and will remain the problem for a good many years. Various committees have considered various aspects of the problem in the last few years, such as the Hadow Committee, the Dugald Clerk Committee on Engineering, and the Goodenough Committee on Salesmanship and the
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  South Wales Committee. There is one finding common to all and one strand which runs through all their reports, namely, the lack of co-operation between industry and commerce on the one side and education on the other. They stress the need for closer contact. The study must influence the market place, and the market place the study. The scholar whose study lamp lights up the world is ineffective if there are none who know how to work in the light of that lamp. The teachers themselves suffer from the separation of the school from industry and industry itself suffers by its separation from the school.
  We must break down the barriers which now exist and have existed for generations between the schools and industry and commerce. The committee on salesmanship was presided over by Sir Francis Goodenough, a most able chairman, and it presented a most able report in which specific attention was drawn to the question of recruitment. They pointed out that business leaders, and the same applies to industrial leaders, should insist on the most careful recruitment from school for their concerns, and the committee found, in effect, that a substantial number of firms in this country know little either of the schools from which their recruits come or of the work done in those schools. I think it comes to this, that many firms are still using pre-War recruiting methods, the methods which were in vogue 30 years ago, regardless of the immense advance which has taken place in our education. Before the War the majority of recruits to industry and commerce were drawn from the public elementary schools and the school leavers of 13 or 14 years of age. There was no other source because the secondary school population was very small.
  10.30 p.m.
  The position to-day has immensely altered. For every boy and girl in the secondary schools in the decade from 1900 to 1910 there are four to-day. The secondary school population has increased fourfold. It is obvious that if the policy of recruiting from the public elementary schools is continued, a large number of the most able boys and girls will be missed for the simple reason that at the age of 11 they have been drafted from the public elementary schools to the secondary schools, and in certain cases to the central schools, on the ground of

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  merit and ability. That is a fundamental point which employers throughout the land might consider. There is, I know, a great diversity in these recruits, but there is a great diversity of jobs to fill, and employers might find it difficult to grasp thoroughly the intricacies of the scholastic system. I find it remarkably difficult myself. At the same time they might try, and I suggest that this report should be carefully studied by all employers throughout the country. We are taking steps to do our best to give it all the publicity possible, with the help of Sir Francis Goodenough, the chairman. Conferences have been arranged and are taking place, the co-operation of the Association of Chambers of Commerce has been obtained, and a questionnaire is now practically on its way to all chambers of commerce in the country, asking for their assistance and for information. This is a case, I might appeal to the Committee, in which they might give signal assistance by getting into touch with their local chambers of commerce in their constituencies and endeavouring to see to it that attention and, if possible, operative force are given to this report.
  There is another point raised by this report to which I will draw attention. It affects the question of part-time release for further education and technical education, and in the daytime. I do not want to weary the Committee with figures, but here are one or two that affect this matter. With regard to school leavers between 14 and 16, there are rather over 200,000 getting further education for themselves in the evening classes; and of those who are older, from 16 to about 21, there are something like 750,000. That is to say, nearly a million boys and girls in this country are educating themselves in evening classes and, in the vast majority of cases, when their day's work is over and they have had a full day's work in a factory or in a shop. All honour to them; and the nation that can produce figures like that can be proud of itself. At the same time, it is a wasteful process, it is a weeding-out process, and sometimes a ruthless process, and many good ones must fall by the way who are not capable of the strain of attending evening classes for a year or for two years
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  or more, and doing their day's work at the same time.
  When it comes to the figures for the day time, in which employers do release their boys and girls for one day or more days in the week, these figures, as my right hon. Friend pointed out, are negligible. I think they amount to under 15,000, and he pointed out with great force that in the case of a certain foreign country, if the figures of our population were compared with it, the number released by our employers for day time education would be in the neighbourhood of 500,000. I am very well aware of the industrial and commercial difficulties involved but here again I make an appeal to employers to give this thing more of a trial than it has had, to make a beginning, it may be, with selected apprentices for one or two days a week, on the condition that in the other part of their time they attend evening classes. It would give this scheme a far better chance so as to make it more feasible for boys to get an education in the day time, when they are in a better condition bodily and mentally, to receive it. There are Members in this House who are employers, and perhaps they might consider the question and find out whether, in the organisation of their works, it is possible here and there to release selected boys and girls for part-time education in the day.
  I need hardly stress the value of this part-time education. It enables the work of the boy or girl to be carried on pari passu with what he is doing in the shop or the factory. In the shop he is learning how; in the school he can learn why, and it does enable him to take far more interest, and it gives him far more purpose, in his work if he is carrying on part-time education at the same time as he is carrying on his daily avocation. In the old days before the War, the theory was that it did not matter what you taught a boy so long as he disliked it. To-day we have changed that. By part-time release, so that pari passu with his work and livelihood a toy can have one or more days to learn in school the why and wherefore of his work, he is given a purposefulness in his learning which otherwise it would be difficult to impart. The State is now taking the place of the employer in the training of the apprentices. It is increasingly difficult to train apprentices; works are so

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  large and complex that employers cannot do it.
  That leads me to the question of junior technical schools, which definitely take the part of the training of apprentices. We should probably concentrate still more on making them definitely trade schools such as the printing school in London. In any event, it is satisfactory to note that they are on the increase. In 1920 there were 15,000 pupils in junior technical schools whereas to-day the number is 21,500. I hope that it will be possible to increase these schools. On the whole, there is little difficulty in placing boys in work when they have been to these schools, and I hope that it will be possible in selected areas to make more of them. As regards technical training generally and the progress since the War, there again there is a large and gratifying increase in the number of students. In 1919–20 the number was 788,000; in 1930–31 it was 950,000 in evening classes. But technical training must be based on a sound general education. Otherwise we shall find ourselves in the same difficulty as the old mechanics' institutes, which had to adopt a system of continuation schools in order to fit boys and girls for technical training.
  I would like to endorse and emphasise the point of the hon. Member for Caerphilly which he made in connection with the South Wales Regional Co-ordination. There are nine local education authorities in South Wales which provide technical education for the coal industry. Similarly in Lancashire and Cheshire 17 authorities provide education for the cotton industry. In Yorkshire there are seven for the woollen industry. It would be a great advantage if some effort to make this provision more compact was set going. The area of a local education authority is not coterminous with the area of industry but something is being done in that direction and I should like to pay my tribute in this connection to the Yorkshire Council for Further Education. I hope that action will be taken on the lines of the report to which the hon. Member referred.
  We have experienced great educational changes since the War. If ever there was a time when the nation was thinking educationally I believe it to be now. The Hadow Report is itself a part of a
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  great forward development, and if full value is to be got from the re-organisation under the Hadow scheme we must make full use of our technical colleges and institutes. In my view there are three lines of approach to technical education—first through the secondary school, second through the senior school via the continuation classes. I say in parenthesis that I hope that increased attention will be given in these new and experimental senior schools to manual training and manual skill. It is just as illiberal to be untrained in hand and eye as it is to be untrained in brain, and manual training is an essential educational vitamin—I call it vitamin M. The third line of approach is through the junior technical school, and the junior commercial school or the junior art school.
  The general scheme seems to be this: You have your system of primary education up to 11 plus. After that it branches into two forms of secondary education, the post primary or the senior school, where the leaving age at present is 14 plus, and the secondary school where the leaving age at present is about 16. They represent a parallel system of secondary education. If one is asked to distinguish one from the other, the answer would be that on the whole the secondary system is more academic and less practical in character, and the post primary is more practical and technical in character. I would like to see them both culminating in what I will call a tertiary system—on the side of the secondary schools in a university, either the old or the new universities, and on the side of the senior schools in technical colleges. If the universities are to be the coping stone and complement of the secondary schools the technical colleges must be the complement of the senior schools.
  The general position is, of course, governed by financial considerations. We are expending to day three times what we spent on education prior to the War, and I wish I could think that education was three times as good. That is one of those things which cannot be measured by money, and statistics very soon prove to be fallacious. There is a considerable danger of overlooking the big issues in admiration or criticism of detail. I admit that financial stringency

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  retards expansion, hub, on the other hand, it does, I believe, bring certain benefits. I doubt whether easy money is particularly good for educational administration, any more than it is particularly good for the individual. The experience of other countries has shown that crude experiments and loose thinking accompany extravagance, and expenditure can quite easily outrun preparation. So many trees get planted that we cannot see the wood, and there is no social service in which it is so difficult to see the wood. We require time to take stock and think out new lines of advance.
  We must be ready for the better times when they come. We have a most difficult problem before us. We have to consider the relation of industry to commerce and other vital subjects like the balance of technical education, both practical and academic, the future of the senior schools, which are now in the experimental stage, involving immense responsibility for the teachers, who have a very important task to perform. I only hope that by experiments and wise judgment they will succeed, and that each school will be an experiment in itself and that we shall gradually evolve something better than anything we have yet experienced. About 100 years ago we had an industrial revolution, but to-day we are in the midst of an educational revolution. I wish the educational revolution could have preceded the industrial revolution. It is too much to hope that the fortunate circumstances that led to our pre-eminence after the Napoleonic Wars will recur. We are no longer pioneers and other nations have drawn level with us. In my opinion, our future, our hope, lies no longer in the production of better machines but better men and women, and it is upon education working hand in hand with industry and commerce that we must rely, remembering that the nation which does not value trained intelligence is doomed.
  Mr. RHYS DAVIES: I hope I shall be allowed to intervene in this Debate for a few minutes to allude to some of the points which have been put forward in the statement to which we have just listened. I want to know what the Board of Education proposes to do in the near
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  future in regard to new elementary schools in newly-developed suburbs. In the Estimates the Board of Education has already laid down a limit, but I hope it will not apply to the new estates. I want to make a suggestion in all humility about the classes in salesmanship. The general complaint against our salesmen is that they expect all Continental nations to understand them in the English language, whereas every foreign traveller who comes to this country is supposed to know our language.
  Reference has also been made to technical education. I have come in contact with the problem myself once or twice. I hope the hon. Gentleman is not going to lay it down that a boy who has an aptitude for technology who desires to enter a higher educational institution for technological training, must, of necessity, have already passed the matriculation standard. I was once on an education authority which had a very large technical college of its own, and we had a great contest on this point. Some would have it that we should not allow children who attended our own junior technical schools to pass on to our own college of technology unless they matriculated. A boy with no technological aptitude at all but who had matriculated, could enter the college, but another boy with all that aptitude but who had not matriculated, could not enter it as a day student. That is a very important point. In that contest I am glad to say, my side won, as is usually the case.
  The schoolmaster of the right hon. Gentleman is of course the Treasury and I am not sure that I quite agree with the criticisms passed on the President of the Board of Education, because to-day all he has done is carry out the decisions of his Government. He belongs to a very doubtful Government, and I am a little astonished sometimes that he still maintains his position in it. He did however his very best with the Estimates as a good Radical embroiled in the toils of Toryism. I will leave that point because it hardly belongs to the subject of education. I hope the Board of Education will stand firm against one tendency which, I believe, is governing in the land. Once upon a time we succeeded in making all places in secondary schools in Manchester free without any fee, but I believe the tendency now is backwards.

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  I trust the Board of Education will do its best to prevent any local authority which has already adopted complete freedom without payment of fee in secondary schools sliding back to the old fee paying system. Where one town has secondary schools which are absolutely free and another town nearby charges a fee up to 50 per cent., it is very unfair on the children of the one town as against those of the other.
  One word about the very burning subject of teachers' salaries. There is an aspect of the problem to which I should like to draw serious attention. I am told that there are caretakers of schools in this country who are paid better wages than the teachers. I am not familiar with all the details, but if that really be the case I think it is a disgrace. I know a young man who is a bachelor of science and a bachelor of arts who has served seven years as a teacher and his wage at this moment is only £4 5s. a week or thereabouts. I really do not think those wages are a credit to us as a community.
  There is one other subject which I have not heard mentioned. I am very interested in the question of backward children—those who cannot be exactly regarded as mentally deficient but who are backward mentally. There is the deaf child, too, the blind child and the crippled child, and I am informed by those who study the problem closely that there is a tendency towards an increase in their numbers in the community. If that be so, I sincerely trust the Board will keep its eyes on these little children who are by nature not endowed with all their faculties. Having said that, may I join with those who have spoken well of the value of our system of education. I conceive education not merely as a means whereby a young boy or girl may be able to earn a livelihood, but as something which develops the brain power so that boys or girls when leaving school shall be capable of thinking correctly; be able to read newspapers or books of any kind, and having done so be able to say to themselves that they can determine from that reading the difference between right and wrong. That is what I conceive to be education. Although I think the Estimates do not go far enough, I hope to see the day come, and I am
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  optimistic enough to believe it is coming, when a better Government will deal with education on a more generous scale than the right hon. Gentleman has been able to do to-day.
  Mr. T. WILLIAMS: I should like to ask the President of the Board of Education two questions. In the first place, I understand that the deaf and dumb child is nobody's responsibility. As the right hon. Gentleman will know, deaf and dumb boys and girls must remain at school till they are 16, and, therefore, they start in life with every disadvantage that can be imposed on them. They have their physical disability, and they are not available for work till two years after the ordinary child who leaves school at 14; and it is natural that the average employer will prefer the boy at 14, who only requires a 14-years wage. Therefore, unless some person or body is responsible for providing opportunities for deaf and dumb boys and girls who have to attend these special schools, they will, when they are available for the labour market, suffer a tremendous disadvantage as compared with ordinary children. I know that there are some voluntary organisations which do this work, but there are many districts, including Yorkshire, where there are no such organisations. Has the advisability been considered of trying to make what seems to be everybody's job, and which is nobody's job, somebody's duty and obligation? My other question is as to why so many children between the ages of 17 and 19 who are ready for entering a college or university have been denied the opportunity this year. Is it due to any phase of economy, and, if so, which, and has the right hon. Gentleman that problem in mind?
  Sir D. MACLEAN: Deaf and dumb children are, of course, the charge of this Department until they reach the age of 16. I will bear in mind what the hon. Member has said with regard to their after-care and opportunity, and will give him an answer privately or publicly, as he may wish. As to the other point, the opportunities for employment of those who are already in training colleges, and those who are leaving the training colleges at the end of this year, will, of course, be subject to the fact that educational development must be to some ex-

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  tent restricted, and the entrants into these colleges, as I said at the beginning, will be restricted by 1,000 as from the end of July of this year.
  Question, "That a sum, not exceeding £26,892,576, be granted for the said Service," put, and negatived.
  Original Question again proposed.
  It being Eleven of the Clock, the Chairman left the Chair to make his Report to the House.
  Committee report Progress; to sit again To-morrow.
  The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

  SUPPLY.

    ADJOURNMENT.
    Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Capain Margesson.]
    Adjourned accordingly at One Minute after Eleven o'Clock.