BOARD OF EDUCATION.

HC Deb 07 February 1940 vol 357 cc325-37

Motion made, and Question proposed,

"That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £10, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1940, for the salaries and expenses of the Board of Education, and of the various establishments connected therewith, including sundry grants in aid, grants and expenses in connection with physical training and recreation, and grants to approved associations for youth welfare."

8.13 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education (Mr. Kenneth Lindsay)

It will be seen that the Supplementary Estimate is caused by two main items of expenditure. The larger amount of £588,000 is in respect of grants from the Exchequer to local education authorities. The old grant formula with its complicated provisions was found to be too difficult to operate during war-time, and therefore a new formula has been devised, based on the expenditure of the last year. That has resulted in benefiting local education authorities by transferring from local education authorities to the Exchequer some £500,000 of expenditure.

Mr. Ede

That is based on 1937–38 and not on 1938–39?

Mr. Lindsay

Yes, 1937–38, the year before; the expenditure is based on that. A point which I will dismiss straight away is a small item due to the public-spirited action of the gas industry in providing a special exhibit in the Science Museum. This expenditure is purely a book-keeping entry, since the gas industry itself will be paying it. The third and main item of this Supplementary Estimate deals with the setting up of the National Youth Committee. I do not propose at this late hour to go into detail about the National Youth Committee and its work, unless the Committee particularly desire me to do so. I am hoping that at the end of next month, when we have a general Debate on education, to be able to give a more connected account of that work.

There is a special reason for that to which I will refer in one minute. At the outbreak of war, some of us felt that it was urgently necessary to do something to deal with the question of adolescents, partly because of the drying-up of subscriptions tovoluntary bodies peculiarly associated with this work and partly because of the abnormal conditions of the black-out, the strain on the home and, in many cases, the withdrawal of the parents. We therefore set up the National Youth Committee, as it is called. Our first job was to get ready a new circular with a new call to local education committees. That circular, which was sent out more than two months ago, invited local education committees to submit schemes before the end of this month. I am very glad to say that out of 146 authorities nearly 80 have already taken some action. I have, unfortunately, been indisposed during the last six weeks, otherwise I should have been able to tour various parts of the country. I have so far been able to go only to Liverpool and Manchester, but in the course of the coming months I hope to see a large number of authorities in the Midlands and in the North and to try to bring home to them, and to the other bodies concerned, the importance of this work.

From the response which we have already received I am happy to say that local education authorities have welcomed this new responsibility which has been laid upon them for dealing with the 14-to-18-year period. I could say more about the work of the National Youth Committee. We have met several times. We have with us representatives of the local education authorities, of the teaching profession, of industry, of trade unions, of employers, and of the voluntary bodies. As chairman of the committee, I can say that they are working together in a way which makes it possible, it seems to me for the first time, to have a focus for the youth work of this country. I want to see a similar focus in each locality throughout the country. We have paid special attention to getting young people themselves on to the local youth committees. It is very easy for a body of men and women, all of them perhaps over 40, to think that they are interpreting what youth wants or what the need of the day is. We specially ask that on the committees set up in various areas there should be representatives of people between the ages of 18 and 30, not necessarily attached to any voluntary body. I am proposing to have a similar panel who can advise us at the centre.

You may say, How was this money, £35,000, spent? I am glad to say that the money was allocated straight away. The need was absolutely urgent. There was an absence of leaders, and, in some cases, premises had been taken over for Defence purposes. Subscriptions to voluntary bodies have been falling off, and we put money at the disposal of the main voluntary bodies. As we had the chairman and vice-chairman of the Standing Conference of National Voluntary Organisations on the committee, this was simple. Then we rightly gave a grant to the Central Council for Recreative Physical Training, which is the central body for such work in this country. A corps of 22 trained and experienced representatives of this body—11 men and 11 women—have gone out into the various regions in the country and have put themselves at the disposal of local education authorities, voluntary organisations and firms, to assist in and stimulate the work. The authorities' physical training organisers can hardly tackle it because they are so busy with the schools. We have had regular reports from Miss Colson, who is the secretary of that Central Council, and I am sure that the money is well spent.

A further sum of £4,500 in the first instance was put at the disposal of a small committee to allot to clubs not affiliated to the principal voluntary organisations. Some of these clubs are of a very interesting type and have been started since the war. For instance, there are mixed clubs, sometimes called in-and-out clubs, and sometimes called black-out clubs, which have started in the populous areas and which are being helped through this committee. The National Youth Committee are considering a whole range of subjects. We are considering, for instance, the problem of youth and training on the land. We have been considering the problem of the "16 to 20's,"as they are sometimes called, and a great many different suggestions have been made, because, as hon. Members will realise, full time education has been interrupted, and, in many cases, jobs which many young fellows would have gone into, such as apprenticeships in firms and so on, are no longer open to them. Those boys—I do not say a very large number—have become unemployed, and we thought their need would be within the scope of our work. We have also had before us a number of kindred problems. We have taken emergency action about the re-opening of clubs and the release of their buildings from Defence purposes.

More and more I think we shall come to regard the National Youth Committee as the place where the Departments, organisations and young people themselves will find their questions being discussed. In some cases we can only discuss them and then pass on our recommendations to the proper quarter. With the formation of youth committees as I hope in every Part II authority—and even perhaps in Part III areas, although that is a bigger question—there will be a chain of youth committees representing the work which is being done for those between 14 and 20 under the education authorities' auspices. I can only say that I have very great hopes of the future of the National Youth Committee. I hope that all the local education authorities will respond before the end of this month, or before the end of next month at the latest, and I also hope that by getting those of 14 to 18 years of age more under the control of the education authorities, we shall have laid the foundation of something in our education system which many of us desire.

Mr. G. Griffiths

Does this youth welfare entirely supersede the physical fitness committees?

Mr. Lindsay

The activities of the National Fitness Council and the local committees which were responsible to it were suspended on the outbreak of war.

Mr. Griffiths

They are not only suspended; they are cleared out, are they not? I have put it a bit bluntly.

Mr. Lindsay

Yes.

Mr. Griffiths

Then there is no chance of these folks getting that money which you promised them?

8.26 p.m.

Mr. Lees-Smith

I desire to congratulate the hon. Member on his recovery and on his reappearance in the House. He has told us that these Supplementary Estimates contain one main item and that the purpose of that item is for the National Youth Committee which is to replace the National Fitness Council. Of course, that is one way of putting it. This is an admission on his part and on the part of the Government of a very gross error on which the whole of this fitness movement was originally based, and which the Government persisted in committing in spite of the fact that as soon as the Bill was introduced on Second Reading I myself warned them that the whole Bill was based on the wrong foundation and that some day we should see the result which the hon. Member has now unfolded to the House. Not only I, but my hon. Friends also gave the warning. We pointed out that these problems of national fitness and health are problems which involve the fundamental problems of administration; that they involve problems of the proper distribution of money between physical education and physical recreation, and that a man was in no way qualified to form judgment on problems of that kind merely because he could run a quarter of a mile faster than anyone else.

The Government set up this National Fitness Council; it was a very amateur body, and the building up of the physical fitness organisation was left to them. We pointed out that bodies which should administer this sort of experiment should be local authorities consisting of men and women who have given their whole interest and attention to problems of national health of the very kind on which they would now be asked to give their opinion. Our advice was not taken. A great deal of money was being spent, and a great deal of money has been wasted. The National Fitness Council got no response or interest from the public. I remember how it was started with considerable boosting by the Minister who is now Minister for Air. Now the mistake is admitted in the middle of a war, under very unfavourable circumstances; our original advice has been forgotten, and the matter has been handed over to the local education authorities. As the hon. Gentleman knows, there will be a Debate on education within two or three weeks, and we shall then look forward to having from him a full account of this subject, and we shall be able to discuss it more fully. When that Debate comes my hon. Friends and I will still have some advice to give as to the future of this experiment, and I would ask the hon. Gentleman in the meanwhile to tune his mind to be more responsive to the advice we shall then give than the then Minister was three years ago.

8.31 p.m.

Mr. Tomlinson

With respect to the first item of £588,000, there are one or two observations that I should like to make. The Minister suggested that in war-time the complicated grants system could not be worked, and said that therefore they had fallen back upon, the years 1937–38, and that that meant an added expenditure, which is the sum we are voting to-night. I wish that, as a consequence of the war, we could regularise this procedure on a slightly different basis, and get away from the antiquated grants system.

The Chairman

The hon. Member must not go into that on a Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. Tomlinson

I was simply pointing out that the reason for the Supplementary Estimate was the complicated grants system, which could not be worked in war-time.

The Chairman

That may be, but the hon. Member must not now discuss that complicated system.

Mr. Tomlinson

No, I have no intention of doing so. I know that the Committee would not listen to me, and that I should not be in order at this stage. But I want to point out that, while this is gratifying to those local authorities which have gained as a result, provision is not made for the carrying-out of the promises given by the Government, and that some local education authorities in this country, even when we have voted this £588,000, will be in a worse position as a consequence of the change than they were previously. If I may give an illustration—

The Chairman

That will come on the main Vote, not on the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. Tomlinson

I am afraid it will not come on the main Vote. The argument that was put forward by my right hon. Friend a moment ago applies similarly to this, that if advice is not taken at the time, it is lost for ever. These local authorities have no power to go back on the decision once it is taken. Local authorities which were receiving 50 per cent. of the expenditure for certain items are now receiving only 19 per cent. I could give proof of this, and will do so in the Debate on education, when the Chair is not quite so strict as at the moment. I am glad that my right hon. Friend reminded the Minister of the warning that was given, that the physical fitness campaign would not work. The reasons that were then given for that prophecy have been proved to be correct. It was largely because the voluntary organisations were not in a position to carry out the administrative work which was necessary, although those organisations cost a lot of money. I hope the Government are going to be as generous in the years to come as they were in the years when they were trying to make the voluntary organisations work. It cost £135,000 for that last year, which is rather a large sum to pay in order to prove that an experiment was not worth while.

I will appeal to the Minister to consider before the end of March that other question about which he merely dropped a hint. If we are to get value for the Supplementary Estimate, we need to realise the pitfalls that yet confront those committees. I am anxious that the local committees should respond. It is the county councils who are responsible but the greatest work done under this scheme will be done in industrial areas under Part II authorities as far as some localities are concerned. Unless you get co-operation between Part II and Part III authorities the scheme will fall down, for the simple reason that those Part III organisations which have been doing similar work will carry on in the same way as they have been doing. The Minister, in his Circular explaining the working of this service of youth, says that there will not be much difficulty in this connection because there is already machinery for delegating the work of higher education. In some districts there is, but it is not delegated in the true sense of the word; it is a co-operation rather than a delegation. It is not a delegation, in the sense that the higher education committee of a Part III authority have no power to raise more than a penny rate for education. The money will have to be found otherwise than by the local education authorities. I want some machinery by which co-operation between Part II and Part III authorities can be brought about so that we can touch every section of the community.

I was glad to read the reference to clubs. Black-out clubs and others were mentioned—I was glad that there was no reference to "diddlem"clubs. We have had quite a number of clubs set up. For that reason, I am glad the work is to be scrutinised and inaugurated mainly by the local education authorities. I think they can work with the voluntary organisations, like the Workers' Educational Association, which have been in need of assistance, but they will scrutinise and inaugurate this work, and they will be able, therefore, not only to provide the type of club which is necessary, but to see that it is going on right lines. I hope that not too much will be made of the physical fitness side of the business. To me the preparation of youth—if I may say so without using the term sloppily—is a spiritual rather than a physical business. There is more to be done in mental training than in physical training.

The Chairman

The hon. Member is getting on to the main Vote.

Mr. Tomlinson

Yes, but it is the subject for which this money is being provided.

The Chairman

But the hon. Member is going outside the Rules of Debate on Supplementary Estimates, which are very narrow indeed. The hon. Member cannot discuss policy, which is a matter for the main Vote.

Mr. Tomlinson

With all respect, Sir Dennis, I suggest that unless money provided under the Supplementary Estimate for the inauguration of a service is spent on right lines, the money—which will be spent when the main Vote is before us—may be wasted. The point that I want to make is that it is essential that we should begin on right lines and get the clubs, the institutions, and the classes working in a properly constituted way, with proper supervision.

8.39 p.m.

Mr. Creech Jones

I welcome the provision which is being made to enable local authorities, in conjunction with the approved societies, to encourage the development of facilities for social welfare and physical training and recreation among young people. I sincerely hope that in administering this fund the Board will keep in mind the special position which has arisen since the outbreak of the war in industrial districts, into which large numbers of young people have been brought away from their homes, and where no social provisions or amenities exist at all. I represent a constituency where a large number of young people have come into the town. The resources of the local inhabitants are already exhausted by their own good deeds and the provision of certain welfare work, and little money is available to meet the need of social amenities of the young people who have now come there to work, and the result is that in the evenings, when work is over, nothing is done, or very little can be done, to provide either recreational or physical welfare work. The consequence is likely to be demoralisation and unhappiness for these young people during their leisure hours. Therefore, I welcome the beginning of this movement. By using approved societies, and by administration in conjunction with the local authorities, some extremely valuable work can be done, particularly at this moment, among the young people who are torn away from their homes and are living in a completely new environment, and who in the conditions of the black-out and of war are subjected to very severe moral stresses and strains. I sincerely hope that that aspect of the problem will be kept in mind in the administration of this new money.

8.42 p.m.

Mr. Ede

I would like to join my right hon. Friend in congratulating the Parliamentary Secretary on his return to the House. We shall not now be assured by the Junior Whips on a Thursday that the information we desire will be obtained from the hon. Member when he comes back, but we shall be able to get it from him first-hand. The Junior Whips have been most obliging and polite, and if the hon. Member redeems all the promises that they have made in his name we shall get a great deal more than is provided for in this Supplementary Estimate. With regard to the first part of the Supplementary Estimate, I take it that the old grant formula is now dead and buried, and that, whatever the future holds, we may rest assured that that will never see a resurrection, and that now some serious attention will have to be given to the production of a grant formula really in accordance with modern conditions. There are some authorities, as my hon. Friend the Member for Farnworth (Mr. Tomlinson) has said, who will not regard the present proposal with complete gratification, but I think that for the majority of the authorities in the country it represents an attitude on the part of the Board which is perhaps even more generous than just. That much ought to be said, and we must hope that the Board will bear in mind the special difficulties which may confront a few local authorities upon whom the new proposal may work hardship, and that they may receive special consideration from the Board.

I cannot help thinking that, with regard to the wiping out of the National Fitness Council and its area committees, and the establishment of the new committee, the two subjects have been rather more closely connected this evening in the Debate than they actually are on the facts of the case. The National Fitness Council and its area committees were wiped out. That was Act I. I am not at all sure that it was in the same play that Act II—the establishment of the service ofyouth—originated. I regard the first as a piece of panic administration and the second as an afterthought. I have listened with some surprise to my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friends this evening in the hope that they foster of the new organisation. It is only a proof of the truth of the saying, Hope springs eternal in the human breast, and no matter how often we are disappointed we still hope for something better from the next exposition of Government policy. As one who is engaged in the administration of the new policy, as I was in the old, I see very hittle change, except that now we have the local education authorities doing the work instead of the area committees, but we are still ultimately dependent in the main upon these very inefficient voluntary organisations. In the actual districts you are to depend upon getting these organisations on to their feet.

The hon. Gentleman to-night was quite frank. He said that one cause for the setting up of this work was the drying up of the voluntary subscriptions to these organisations. We are merely going to replace the voluntary subscriptions that are now being paid, not on a voluntary basis, to the Chancellor of the Exchequer instead of to these voluntary bodies, but I do not think that we shall get the kind of advantage that the hon. Gentleman mentioned. I believe that the work must be organised on a more scientific and workmanlike basis than it has been hitherto, if the provision of this money is really to be worth while. You can subsidise these voluntary organisations as long as you like, but you will never get the efficient work from them for which my hon. Friends have been asking this evening. The things for which my hon. Friend the Member for Farnworth is asking are not in the main going to be done in these clubs; they are going to be done in classes and organisations that will be effectively originated, managed and controlled by the local education authorities, who will, increasingly during the next few years, have to do this work. The great majority of the young men who were engaged in the voluntary organisations are now with the Services in one form or another. They have disappeared, and, as the age for military service rises, the few who are left will gradually be taken away and their places will have to be taken by persons provided by the local education authorities.

How far has the survey that was made by the old National Fitness Council been preserved? There were various area committees that conducted very extensive and detailed surveys of all the facilities that were available, as far as the physical education side was concerned, in their various areas. The two counties for which I was responsible had virtually completed a survey of every parish, and they had a list of the organisations that were run by the local authorities and of those that were run by voluntary organisations in the whole of the area. We were on the point of trying to fill in the gaps and prevent overlapping. I know that most of the areas had nearly completed a similar survey, which must, even in its unfinished form, be of the very greatest value, and I hope that that will be available for Part II educational authorities when they have to establish their schemes under the Service of Youth movement. It would be lamentable in these times, with depleted staffs, if we had to go all over that work again and re-collect the information.

The area committees were shut down with such haste that I am not at all sure that all the documents were collected, but I hope that such documents as are available will now be passed on almost at once to the local education authorities so that they can have the benefit of the information collected when they set about starting their Service of Youth schemes. If this scheme is to be worth while it will cost a great deal more money than is now being provided. It is a kind of scheme which could easily be wrecked by spending too little money. I am not advocating any extravagant expenditure, but if we are to do the thing at all we had better do it well. If we half do the thing it is worse than not doing it at all, and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will be able to assure the House that local education authorities will receive the fullest co-operation from the Board of Education as this scheme begins to grow.

I do not share in all the disappointment which has been expressed with regard to the National Fitness Council. I believe their staff served them well, that the work they did up to the time they were officially suspended was good, and that the next two or three years would have seen a widening of their activities that would have justified a good deal of expenditure. But what I want to ask is: Have the staffs that did that work received from the Board that treatment they ought to have had? Has the Board been able to place them with local education authorities or in such positions that would enable their work to be carried on? So far as my own area is concerned the only person who managed to get a job was one for whom I obtained a job myself. The remainder did not get a job and it is a serious thing that these people should have been left in such a position at a time when the obtaining of employment is very difficult. I would ask the hon. Gentleman to look into their position and do what he can to assist them.

8.53 p.m.

Mr. Lindsay

I would like to say a word or two in answer to the hon. Gentleman who has just spoken. I cannot let it go out that the formation of this Youth Committee was an afterthought. It is a deliberate and carefully thought-out policy. So far as I am concerned I believe the right way to carry out this policy is through the education authorities. I do not share to the full the criticism which has been made of the Fitness Council. I think they did a valuable work, but I always felt that the machinery was too cumbrous. As regards the point about surveys, they have been preserved and have already mostly been put at the disposal of local authorities. Lastly, we have made attempts to get the staff, where they possessed suitable qualifications for the work, employment in Government Departments and in local authorities' offices. I hope that local education authorities who may now be requiring staff for their local Youth Committees will help us further in this matter.

Question put, and agreed to.

Resolved,

"That a Supplementary sum, n6t exceeding £10, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1940, for the salaries and expenses of the Board of Education, and of the various establishments connected therewith, including sundry grants in aid, grants and expenses in connection with physical training and recreation, and grants to approved associations for youth welfare."