39. Lieut.-Colonel MOOREasked the President of the Board of Education whether in the interests of the dairying industry, he will consider the advisability of co-operating with the Minister of Agriculture with a view to evolving a scheme for the compulsory daily supply of milk to all children in the country of school age?
§ Mr. RAMSBOTHAMThe hon. and gallant Member is no doubt aware of the great increase which has taken place in recent years in the numbers of school children receiving a daily supply of milk, both under schemes for which local education authorities take responsibility and under those conducted under the auspices of the National Milk Publicity Council. My right hon. Friends the President of the Board of Education and the Minister of Agriculture are both anxious to see 1961 a further extension of these arrangements and are co-operating with the National Milk Publicity Council to that end; but they have no power to exercise any compulsion in this matter either on local education authorities or on the parents.
Viscountess ASTORDoes not the hon. Gentleman think that, seeing the increased health of those children who have been given milk, it would be a better policy for the Government to give a subsidy for milk instead of for wheat?