ELEMENTARY EDUCATION (ELECTIONS) BILL—(No. 231.)—SECOND READING. (Hansard, 23 July 1872)

§ THE MARQUESS OF RIPON
, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, it was one to confirm certain Orders of the Education Department, and also to make provision with respect to the election of school boards. It was necessary for Parliament to do something in the matter during the present Session, because the Orders made by the Department in 1870 and 1871 would not have any force after next September, and the Orders in question would be confirmed by the Bill. The 1602 Bill further proposed to establish a uniform system of election, by extending to the country districts the principle which had been already adopted in the election of the School Board for the metropolis—namely, that of Ballot, and which had been found to work well. The noble Marquess concluded by moving the second reading of the Bill.

§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY
said, his objections to the Bill were founded partly on its substance, and partly on the procedure proposed. He thought it wrong that an ordinary Continuance Bill, introduced at that period of the Session, should be made to carry with it so important a principle as the introduction of the Ballot for the first time into the school-board elections in the country districts. Even if he were not an opponent of the Ballot, he should think this a very unwise precedent, for there was no ground for such an extension of the Ballot, and there were several reasons against it. In the first place, he denied that the Ballot had been admitted as a recognized system in Parliamentary and municipal elections. The Ballot was on its trial there. That was the compromise made between the two Houses. Secret voting was allowed a trial, but had not been definitely accepted. Why, then, should their Lordships adopt the Ballot, as was now proposed, without any limitation as to time, in the school-board elections? When the trial of secret voting was over, and the success of the system assured, there would be no objection to extend it to the school-board as well as to other elections. School-board elections were not, however, analogous to Parliamentary and municipal elections. They belonged rather to the class of elections for Poor Law Guardians, Highway Boards, and vestries, forming part of the local government of the country districts, and there was no reason why the new system of voting adopted for Parliamentary and municipal elections should be brought into the management of parochial affairs. Almost all their Lordships who were acquainted with the country districts would admit that such an innovation would be exceedingly distasteful. A noble Duke (the Duke of Argyll) admitted the other day that there was a strong reluctance 1603 among the country clergy, amounting almost to aversion, towards the Education Act. The change now proposed would make the Act more distasteful than ever, and was it wise to load a system which was already disliked, with additional elements of unpopularity? One great danger, moreover, in the Ballot was, that it would deprive the people of all interest in Parliamentary elections, and if so, by equal reasoning the same would happen in the case of municipal and school-board elections. In fact, that had been eminently the case at a recent School-Board election in Lambeth, where, though considerable feeling was aroused by the fact that the denominational and secular systems were pitted against each other, only 7 per cent of the whole constituency could be induced to come to the poll. That was the result of the Ballot, which the noble Marquess said had succeeded very well in London. In the country districts, too, the Ballot was disliked still more than in London, and was regarded as especially un-English; and the result there would be, that large numbers of the electors would stay away from the poll and the elections would be discredited. He had not spoken of the penalties of the Bill, for the simple reason that he considered this was no mere formal enactment, and that it raised a distinct and important question of policy and of principle which the circumstances of the country districts made extremely undesirable there, and which ought not to be introduced at that period of the Session, above all in the form of a mere Continuance Bill. Their Lordships, moreover, must not be asked to read the Bill a second time and make alterations in Committee. They knew by experience the result of adopting such a course, and were not going to fall into such a snare again, and the better course would be to throw out the Bill. No inconvenience could possibly arise from their taking such a course, since the Government could immediately introduce another Bill, simply continuing the present powers of the Education Department. As to the present measure, he asked their Lordships to resist an innovation which would endanger the progress of education in the country districts, and he would, therefore, move that the Bill be read a second time that day three months.

§ VISCOUNT HALIFAX
thought that when the Ballot applied both to Parliamentary and municipal Elections, it would be absurd to make a distinction in the mode of taking elections for school boards. The Ballot was already in use for the election of the London School Board, and he could see nothing unwise or inconsistent in endeavouring by the Bill under discussion to extend the system through the country.