Lords Sitting of 20 June 1890

FLASHING SIGNALS — ADMIRAL COLOMB'S INVENTION.

  QUESTION—OBSERVATIONS.
  LORD ELPHINSTONE: Before the noble and gallant Lord puts his question whether Her Majesty's Government are now in a position to state what reward they propose to give to Admiral Colomb for his invention of flashing signals, I hope I shall not put him to any in convenience if I ask him to postpone it. The fact is, I am not in a position to give him an answer, for the matter has been out of the hands of the Admiralty for a considerable time now, and is before the Treasury. My noble Friend, however, must not imagine from that that the matter is in any way hung up or has found its way into the proverbial pigeon hole, because it is only a few days ago since we received a letter at the Admiralty from the Treasury asking for further particulars in the matter. If he will postpone his question until next week, I hope to be able to give him an answer.
  LORD SUDELEY: My Lords, I am very happy to put off the question, but I sincerely trust we shall soon receive an answer as to when this matter is likely to be settled. It has been pending now for several years, and it certainly seems a long time to have the matter hung up.

  COST OF PUBLIC EDUCATION.
  LORD NORTON: My Lords, the object I have in moving for the Return of which I have given notice is simply that the public at large may be made aware of the amount of the Treasury Votes made yearly for public national education, wholly irrespective of the charge on local rates, voluntary contributions, endowment, fees, and any other private sources. I hear many men boast that this country is so magnificent in support of education that it votes £5,000,000 a year for the purpose; but I suppose, when this Return is made, which adds to the Public Education Votes those for the Science and Art Department, the Reformatory and Industrial Schools, English, Scotch, Welsh,
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  and Irish Colleges, Military and Naval Colleges, Academies and schools, it will be found that the £5,000,000 will be increased to £10,000,000, at least, from the Treasury alone; and if to that were added the voluntary contributions, endowments, and other private contributions, I fancy the actual expenditure of this country for national education would be very little short of £20,000,000 a year. I do not in the slightest degree grudge that sum. I think, on the contrary, that £20,000,000 a year spent in such an object of first-rate national importance would be well-spent—that is, if it were well-spent. But that, I think, is not the case. What I want to call your Lordships' attention to is whether it is not very ill-spent, very wastefully spent, a great deal of the money going for things which might be very much better done otherwise. Now, the Resolution suggests that all the education which is above what may be called elementary, ought to be defrayed by parents who are both able and willing to defray the expense of the education of their children. Elementary education being the proposed object of these Treasury Votes and the only education wanted by all the nation, higher kinds of instruction in science and art should be paid for entirely from private resources, endowments, and fees paid on the actual receipt of the tuition. The only contributions from the Treasury should be by way of exhibitions and scholarships for poor children who show both the capacity and the desire for that higher education, and who should, in that way, have perfectly free access to the higher schools. I do not wish at this moment to refer to the elementary education given in rural districts at all. That, in fact, cannot be said properly to comprise higher education. In none of our rural districts do the elementary schools go into specific subjects, and very few of the children in those schools reach the Seventh Standard. I will say a word about that afterwards. What I wish to refer to now is higher education. As to the elementally education in rural districts, I still maintain that that should in all cases, except in cases of absolute poverty, be partly, at all events, supported by fees. In rural districts they do not attempt specific subjects, yet for them the higher grants are given, while

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  properly higher fees should he paid, because for richer children. Mr. Forster expressed his intention that such subjects, being taught to those more able to pay for them, should not be aided by grants at all; and in that view he adopted the 9d. fee, at the top of a scale of payment from 1d. weekly. The cry for free education is already, I am glad to see, pretty well seen through and is subsiding. ["No."] The noble Marquess dissents as to the fact, but I can only say that some of its principal advocates have confessed to me that it is subsiding. The fact is, that freedom is seen to mean all being alike taxed, whether they use the schools or not. That is, I think, a very curious sort of free education. The extra 1d. or 2d. which a well-to-do labourer or artisan pays towards the education of his children in these schools is seen not only to be just, but most valuable in order that parents may have some notion that they are contributing at least towards their children's education, and that they are not wholly quartered upon the country. The argument that when attendance in the schools is made compulsory by the State, the State should pay the entire cost of it is now laughed at. Is the State to defray the cost of whatever it compels to be done? Take the case of removal of nuisances, and children brought up in neglect are the greatest of public nuisances. I am led by the cheer of the noble Marquess to say that I think the assistance which the country is expecting from him next year is a very different thing from what is called free education. But, my Lords, we must recollect what elementary education is. It is not mere instruction, elementary or higher, but it includes the religious, moral, and intellectual training of the great mass of the children of the people in whatever position they may afterwards have to live. My Resolution does not refer to the elementary education in rural districts; it refers to science and art. It does not seek to interfere with that early teaching and training which is wanted by the whole nation—that is, the elementary education for all; but it applies to that instruction which is wanted by those who are going into skilled employments; and what I want to call your Lordships' attention to is the question whether that scientific and technical in-
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  struction ought to be charged upon public-taxation in all cases whether such aid is necessary or not. We must bear in mind) that many towns in this country are supplied with sufficient and efficient means-of tuition of that kind from private resources, and from the fees of those able and willing to pay for it; and the means for providing this higher education often come from endowments which are as much private contributions as if their founders were still alive. Should anything more be contributed to that by the people at large than scholarships for children, fit and wanting to use it, whose parents are unable to pay for it? The Commissioners of 1868 proposed to develop, and adapt in three grades to the various localities in the country, such endowed or private middle schools. They calculated that, with very moderate endowments (and the-third grade without any endowment), the very best quality of this science teaching, would require fees from £3 to £6 a year. I have a letter here showing that that calculation is correct. The United Westminster School of 850 boys at this moment exemplifies the highest development of the third grade of Board School at a total cost of £7 a head per annum. In the Cowper Street School, with 1,000' boys, the total cost is £6 per annum. The writer says that if the education is to be really good, and to comprise proper science teaching, perhaps it can hardly be done in London for less than £6 per head; but in country towns such schools would cost less, say £5, and for girls the charge would be less than for boys, say £3. With all such schemes are combined free scholarships for poor, clever children winning them. The parents who want to send children to these middle-class schools mainly consist of two classes. That fact should be borne in mind, in regard to the children generally wanting this secondary instruction beyond the elementary training. The Commissioners of 1868 described one class, the poorer of these middle-class parents, as journeymen, managers of works, clerks, and petty tradesmen; and the richer as larger manufacturers and professional men. It was proposed by the Commissioners that the graded middle schools should be in two divisions, in order to accommodate that difference

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  of wealth and station, those two divisions being the usual commercial and classical sides. Unfortunately, the re-distribution of existing endowments involved in the Commissioners' recommendations, owing to the shifting of the population from the agricultural to the manufacturing localities, was so resisted as to frustrate their proposal. Otherwise, I have myself no doubt that new endowments would have sprung' up to meet the full requirements of the case. But persons were checked in providing such endowments, because what are called higher Board schools were allowed to spring up in various towns throughout the country, not only where middle schools were wanted, but in some instances in absolute competition with endowed and private middle schools which were sufficient for the purpose, and efficiently doing their work. Government Board schools have been allowed to undertake this advanced tuition, checking and even competing with private supply, at an almost unlimited and wasteful expenditure to the public, on what was so much better provided for. Only yesterday I was presenting prizes at a first-rate grammar school at Chesterfield, and I found that the numbers there were kept down very much owing to a Board school giving precisely the same education—it might not have been really as good, but thought good enough by rich manufacturers, who were tempted to send their children there because they could get by aid of rates this education for 9d. a week, instead of £8 or £9 a year. They were thus, by the rivalry of the Board school, starving their own grammar school. I suppose no one would dispute that parents of private means providing equally good requisite education for their own children is infinitely preferable both for the free and independent spirit of this country, and for the unfettered and unofficial training of children, than an eleemosynary and Government system. I think it will be admitted that an independent system of education is infinitely superior for the nation to any Government plan. Another great fault of the higher Board schools in towns is that not only do they compete with the endowed schools, but they are also in mischievous competition with the elementary Board schools, because, pretending to give higher instruction, they
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  begin at the bottom like the others, and so become practically only aristocratic editions of the same school used by the aristocracy of the towns, paying 9d. a week to have their children educated free from contact with the dirty 2d. children for whom the public education was primarily intended. Two amendments in our practice seem to mo to be called for to meet these faults—first, that wherever there are endowed or private schools, sufficient and efficient for the purpose, in any town, the Department should not sanction the establishment and competition of higher Board schools at the public charge. That is my first proposition, and I hope it will meet with general assent. My second proposition is that where such higher Board schools are set up children should not be admitted to them under the fifth standard. If those two amendments were carried out I think a good many of the faults complained of in the present system would be met. That is all the alteration I ask for. I suggest that the only contribution to such higher schools from the Treasury should be in the way of free scholarships for the cleverer children of the poorer classes who are able to make use of them, that is to say, those showing capacity and a desire for higher instruction, hut whose parents cannot afford to keep them longer at school to qualify them for skilled employment. But it seems to me that the folly of the public undertaking the higher education of the children of richer parents, and the folly of having two sets of so-called higher and elementary schools undertaking the same work, is not unlikely, by extravagant waste of money, to cause a far greater moral mischief by causing a rough reaction against the whole system of education altogether. There are two sets of Board schools beginning at the elements and going on to science; the elementary schools attempting science in the most unscientific manner, and the scientific schools beginning at the elements as if there were no elementary schools. Those who advocate these things will find that they are only forcing on the great mass of the community to crowd the employments, not a bit more honourable than manual labour, that are ordinarily filled by the artisan. The London Board schools are at this moment expending nearly £5 per head for every child in

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  them per annum, while the calculation in 1870 was that 30s. would be sufficient. The total expenditure for the children in these schools is, I believe, £4 17s. 6d., and there is this cause for dissatisfaction, that while they are making this enormously increased expenditure they are not increasing the number of children for whom they provide schools according to the ratio of the increase of population. The additional number last year was 3,000, while it ought to have been nearer 10,000. They are not doing one-third of their work in providing for the increased numbers of children. People have argued as if the Scotch plan or the American plan were ours, and our manufacturers are eager for apprentices trained at public expense. But that is not the fact. The Scotch provision for public schools comprises grammar schools and high schools, and those who in England hope to get such a public commercial education upon our elementary education basis are making a great mistake. The Fraser Report to the Commissioners of 1868 shows that Americans are not using the School Rate for all classes. The richer classes are mostly using private schools, and the poorer classes are complaining at having to pay anything for the education of the richer. In saying that, I do not now suggest anything about rural elementary schools. I do not intend to express satisfaction with the mode in which they are dealt with. I consider that in the higher standards children should pay higher fees and receive smaller grants than in the lower standards, as representing education for which parents can easily pay. I think that where there are higher middle schools the elementary schools should stop at a certain standard, and that the children should go from that standard into the higher school instead of the higher school beginning at the ABC, and overlapping the other. Nowhere should boys going to manual labour be kept at school and deprived of the apprenticeship they can only acquire by early practice in their work. A boy sailor, kept at school until he could read in the Fifth Standard one of Shakespeare's plays to the satisfaction of Her Majesty's Inspectors, would be prevented from taking his proper place among British seamen. I know I cannot affect the existing Code of
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  this year. It is too late now to do that; but I cannot help hoping that by calling your Lordships' attention to this subject I shall have more or less affected the concoction of the Code of next year, which, we are led to expect, will be a final edition. We may hope that there will be some definite principle adopted, and not a mischievous uncertainty in the whole of our system of national education. The new Code, while admitting that the system of payment by results is condemned, retains far too much of it. Yesterday a conference of managers, like birds of prey, were gathering round the decaying old system to see what pickings they could still get out of it. As to technical schools, the Report which was only presented yesterday by the Science and Art Department shows that anything yet done under the Act of last year is still merely in embryo. Everybody who desires to act upon it wants to know what it means, and how to set it in motion. I know the difficulty of attaching a meaning to that vague term "technical education." In the Act it means anything which South Kensington says it shall mean; but few attempts have been made chiefly in the way of drawing, which is done in the elementary schools, or, as I have seen in Birmingham, where children are set to work to saw and plane bits of wood. It is only a pretence to call these schools technical, and to undertake them by public means is really standing in the way of manufacturers, such as Whitworth, each in his own line training apprentices for his own work. That would be the best way for competition with the foreign market, and would afford the most practical instruction in various trades. The Government should cease to dream of teaching even the elements of arts everywhere. My Lords, I hope you will agree that the cost of higher education, that is, instruction in science and art, above the elements (and my proposition involves a definition of what elementary education is), should be borne as far as possible by the parents who are perfectly willing and able to pay proper fees, or by endowments, which are as much private contributions as if the founder were still alive. The only way in which the Treasury should contribute to schools of special apprenticeships is by providing exhibitions and scholarships for children

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  who show capacity, but are unable to pay.
  Moved—
  "For a Return of all money voted by Parliament for education in the year ending April last:

  1. For public education, elementary and technical, in England, Scotland, and Ireland;

  2. Science and Art Department, including agriculture;

  3. Reformatory and industrial schools;

  4. Queen's colleges, Ireland, and Welsh colleges:

  5. Military and naval colleges, academies, and schools;

  And "That in the opinion of this House elementary education should be more distinctly defiend in 'the Code,' as recommended by the Royal Commissioners, and the cost of all public instruction above such limits should be met by fees, or by exhibitions for children of the wage earning class capable and desirous of availing themselves of it, or by endowments,"—(The Lord Norton.)
  LORD COLCHESTER: My Lords, I agree very heartily with what has been said by my noble Friend in calling the attention of the House to this matter. In the first instance I think there can be no doubt that what is being done in many oases out of the rates in aid of schools goes beyond the original intentions of those who promoted the Elementary Education Act. The object of passing that Act was to remove the great weight of ignorance pressing upon the poorer classes, whose children are compelled to leave school at an early age. There are some people who seem to think that the best system is that of Switzerland, where almost every grade of education, high and low, is paid for by the State; but that is not the principle, I think, which England is prepared to accept. Then it has been said that everyone who pays the rates in support of these schools would be at liberty to use them for the education of their children. That, I think, is very much on a par with the argument that everyone who pays the poor rate is entitled to the benefit of outdoor relief. I think the expense thrown upon the public at large by this system of elementary schools doing the work of secondary education produces great waste, because they are driving out of the field other classes of schools which
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  can best carry out the work of higher and technical education. Now my noble Friend has referred to the Commission which reported in 1868, and whose Report has been the foundation of all the Acts subsequently passed in relation to endowed schools. That Report certainly did say that a third grade of schools was a great want in this country, and that the higher education should be more efficiently provided for. As the noble Lord has said, they considered that it was the great use of all the smaller endowments throughout England that they should be applied for that purpose. It was to provide for the education of a class rather better off than those who attend the elementary schools, or of those who might be selected from the elementary schools, and as to whom it was considered worth while that, having shown capacity, they should be afforded the means of continuing their education to a greater age, and of entering upon the higher subjects. But, my Lords, I know that in a great many cases those endowments have been almost rendered useless, and they have been almost driven out of the field by the competition of the rate-supported schools, which are maintained out of public funds contributed by the ratepayers. There are a great many of these endowments which for obvious reasons ought to be applied to the lowest form of secondary education. Those endowments were intended, to a great extent, for the benefit of the poorer classes, and they would give those classes a benefit which they could not obtain in any other form. Then, if they are applied a step higher, to the higher secondary education, it would be necessary to raise the fees paid by those who receive it, because there would then be given an education which is not so very much required or desired by the poorer class, for whom, as I have stated, in many cases the smaller endowments were largely intended. The reason their administration has been so much attacked in many quarters is that they are used to a great extent for the middle instead of for the poorer classes. At the present time the schools are undertaking what is the proper work of the endowments, and they are now being made very difficult to apply for any useful purpose. It

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  may be said, "That is all very well; but though there are many places which have, there are many places which have not these endowments." If it wore recognised that this is a want of the country which can be supplied by a little relaxation of the restrictions hitherto imposed upon them, these endowments might be made useful over a considerable extent of the country. Then the noble Lord has referred to the voluntary efforts which have been made to supply schools throughout the country; and I think it would have been shown that by voluntary efforts these requirements could have been met, had it not been that to a great extent they have been killed by the competition of the schools subsidised from the rates. There is another point to which I will refer. Many people say, "Why should not the elementary schools keep on a certain number of boys a little longer for obtaining the higher education—why should not the boys be allowed to go on who have been educated from the beginning in the elementary schools?" Well, there is this difficulty: that the whole plan of secondary education from the first being different you cannot have it carried on on the same lines as the primary education. If a boy is (o remain at school up to a certain age there is no reason why, if he is fit for them, he should not take up the higher studies at an earlier age than that at which the education of others ceases, why he should be educated in the elementary school until 12, and then only begin the secondary education within the last two years. He would probably be able to take it up at a much earlier age. But I think it is undesirable that the primary and secondary schools should be mixed up together. On the other hand, not only is the secondary school more expensive, but it is attended by a class who are better able to pay, and for that education higher fees ought to be paid. The argument that clever but poorer children should not be deprived of the opportunity of obtaining that higher education, may be met by the proposal that exhibitions and scholarships should be provided out of the public money if they cannot be provided out of educational endowments. By this system of allowing elementary schools to enter upon a province which is not theirs you are lot only increasing the expense, but
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  deranging the proper course of education. The objection to the present system is not merely pecuniary, it is also educational. I can vouch for the accuracy of the figures which have been stated by my noble Friend as to the cost at which the Third Grade education can be carried out and the expenditure now entailed by attempting to give this lower form of technical education. I think the employment of endowments is the proper mode of carrying out that object, and that the present system is a derangement of the proper educational system, which brings together and mixes up what ought to be kept entirely separate. It puts an end to private action and tends to kill voluntary effort.
  EARL FORTESCUE: My Lords, the point which I wish principally to dwell upon in the few remarks I shall have to offer to your Lordships is the urgent need which exists of some definition, if not of what elementary education is, at any rate of what elementary education is not. There seems to me no very intelligible line drawn which can serve as a guide between even the highest University curriculum and elementary school teaching in the schools under the direction of the Minister of Education; because it is to be remembered that Ministers may take different views, and may introduce many things into a Code, and, as that becomes law after lying on the Tables of both Houses for 40 days, there is no saying what we may find done by some future Minister of Education. The urgent need of some intelligible line being drawn between elementary and non-elementary schools is one that I have long felt, and have often pressed, both vivâ voce in your Lordships' House and in print. I have repeatedly protested against Government aiding by grants, and therefore securing the right to interfere with higher education, which was in that masterly Report of the Commission of 1868 described as "secondary education;" but now secondary education is liable to come before us disguised under the name of technical instruction, or of advanced elementary schools, which one of the highest educational authorities in the country—Bishop Temple—said "ought to be called non-elementary," and he-added that it was about "the worst way in which money could be applied in the

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  promotion of education." Now, my Lords, Parliament and the public generally have been trying in various ways to encourage thrift, especially among the wage-earning classes, and that not merely for the sake of promoting the accumulation of capital and of preventing waste—an accumulation which, in the aggregate, is considerable, though made tip of very small sums—but even more for the purpose of encouraging a spirit of independence and of self-reliance, as well as self-denial among the poorer classes of the people. Well, my Lords, we are now, on the contrary, threatened with what I venture to say is mis-called "free education." But the real description of what is called free education is State-paid or rate-paid education. It may not, in some instances, be the result of private benevolence that gratitude is elicited; but all experience shows that alms given by an individual—how often, as a rule, injudiciously given?—at least elicit some feelings of gratitude; but anything eleemosynary given out of rates and taxes is grudgingly given by the ratepayers and thankfully received by the recipients. It altogether misses all the wholesome beneficial influences which emanate from eleemosynary gifts made at the expense of self-denial in the giver. I may say that, apart from this idea of free education, a most mischievous system has grown up of late of sanctioning Government grants of money for educational purposes on a greatly enlarged scale, which has been encouraging; the very reverse of the principle which in other capacities we have been trying to develop. We have been thus encouraging a habit of constant reliance on the Government, and constant applications from various bodies for assistance. One industry after another appeals for Government grants, and the great important agricultural interest, which generally moves rather slowly, has at last joined in the general scramble, and has been moving earnestly to get some public money. Everyone seems to be trying to get something out of the rates and taxes a melancholy change within the lifetime of some of us from the habitual love of independence and self-reliance, which was supposed to be the characteristic of Englishmen. We have had examples at South Kensington of
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  grants being sought for and obtained, especially in a very little agricultural department there, by schools in the heart of London, and in the heart of such large towns as Liverpool, for instance. A very large proportion of those little grants have been obtained by schools in towns not in the least for the benefit of the scholars, but for the benefit of the teachers, not with any reasonable prospect of improving the work of agriculture in any agricultural district, but to obtain a certain number of pounds sterling for the particular schools. I will not repeat on the present occasion what I have often reminded your Lordships of, that the tendency of Government establishments is towards stagnation, and too often after a time to jobbery. Stagnation is particularly to be deplored in the case of higher education; and it would be a terrible misfortune if the higher education of the country comes to be manipulated by a Government Department. As to jobbery, the worst part of it is not the waste of money, but the demoralisation and the degrading influence which it exercises in all directions. We surely ought not to extend Government interference further than is absolutely necessary for the good of the country. I understand that that high educational authority. Lord Lingen, says that elementary education ought as such to be considered to stop at the Fourth Standard. I entirely agree with him. Any child who has reached the attainments certified by passing the Fourth Standard has the requisite means of extending his knowledge indefinitely, and particularly if, as both my noble Friends have, I think, very truly said, assistance is given from public money by means of scholarships and exhibitions to superior schools. If there are only one or two children pursuing the higher studies in an elementary school, those higher studies which we find some wishing should be carried on in every school, they will study at very great disadvantage as compared with those who are carrying on the same studies in a class with others in the same state of proficiency, for the spirit of emulation and sympathy will be very much wanting to them. Besides that, for a very small, infinitesimal number of students you will demand a great deal of energy and time from the already, too often, rather overworked

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  teacher in a small school. Now, scholarships from the elementary schools to the higher ones may be provided either out of the taxes by the State or by the Local Bodies out of the rates, which is a little questionable in principle perhaps, but still open to little objection, or by the benevolence of those who are interested in education, many of whom have (as I have myself) contributed for the purpose of giving scholarships to higher schools for the most promising boys from the elementary schools who are ex hypothesi capable of profiting by the higher instruction and are desirous of doing so. As my noble Friend has very truly said, the great majority of children cannot be expected in the short time that precedes the necessity of their earning, or helping to earn, their livelihood, to make very much progress; and their detention at school in order to attain a particular standard and a certain amount of book-learning, the retention of which is very short and precarious in their ease, prevents their learning what is of greater consequence to them. In order to do that you prevent their learning, at the most favourable time, the business of their lives, and thus qualifying themselves to become skilled instead of unskilled workmen. You do this at considerable cost and at the sacrifice of an amount of work for employers, and especially for agricultural employers, which, though small perhaps in the case of each child, is in the aggregate very considerable; and all this because yon will not recognise the essential difference there is between those who are naturally capable and desirous of profiting by the opportunities of higher education placed within their reach, and those who are willing and desirous, as are their parents also, to learn more of the future business of their lives instead. Perhaps I have detained you too long with my own strong convictions on this subject, though I may remind your Lordships they are shared by many others. I will only say that they are borne out by the elaborate Report of the Education Commissioners which was presented in 1888. In the summary of their recommendations they say that
  "As the meaning and limits of the term elementary school' have not been denned in the Education Acts, nor by any judicial or authoritative interpretation, but depend only
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  on the annual Codes of the Department, no whose power of flaming such Cedes no limit has hitherto been imposed, it would appear to be of absolute necessity"
  —very strong words, my Lords, for a strong Commission to use—
  "That some definition of the instruction to be paid for out of the rates and taxes should be given by the Legislature. Until this is done, the limits of primary and secondary education cannot be denned."
  In the Report they describe the successive Codes as emanating from successive Ministers, and Lord Lingen very much disapproves of that system, and describes, that unlimited power as "dangerous." But the Commissioners elaborate this, and it, is one of the conclusions they arrive at. In giving their summary they say, at page 145—
  "Since 1870 the practice of the Department has continually raised and extended the various limits of elementary education so as gradually to include a range of subjects proper to schools for higher education. It is given in evidence that languages, classical and modern, advanced science"
  —just what may be taught, my Lords, and is being taught, at the Universities of the land—might be taught in elementary schools, and that parents of all classes-had a right, and were at liberty, to send their children to them.
  "Not a few of the children of the wealthy classes,"
  as my noble Friend has already stated,
  "are attending the Board (Schools. It does-not appear that in 1870 this result was contemplated; and it has become a matter of serious complaint, especially to those of the poorer classes, who are compelled to pay the (School Board rates. The Act of 1870 enables the Department to frame and impose a Code which after lying a month on the Table in the-Houses of Parliament become law."
  Now, my Lords, I will just give a sample of the great power, I may say the legislative power, exercised by the Department. The Act of 1870 says that it does not include any school in which the ordinary payments in respect of the instruction for each scholar exceeds 9d. per week. It seems from that that the intention of the Legislature was very obvious that 9d. a week was the utmost limit. What, says the Code of a few years ago?—a Code which I was not so much surprised to find emanating from a Government presided over by a master of subtle distinctions, and who, as Mr. Forster, I think it was, said, "Could per-

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  suade most men of most things and himself of almost anything." That Code speaks of—
  "The ordinary payment for each scholar … will, as a rule, be found by dividing the total amount of fees payable by the number of scholars on the registers for that week."
  So that 3s. might be the amount of the fees for some, provided there were a sufficient number of 1d. scholars to bring the actual average down to 9d. My Lords, even the Minority Report says, "It is not desirable that the Department should defeat the plain meaning of an Act of Parliament." I would appeal to your Lordships whether the passage in the Code I have just read does not do so. I must say, my Lords, that it is with great regret I have seen the subsequent Codes at the hands of different Ministers continuing that, in my opinion, very objectionable clause, a clause unquestionably defeating the obvious intention of the Legislature. The Commissioners go on to say in their Report—
  "It would appear, therefore, of absolute necessity that the instruction to be paid for out of rates and taxes should be fixed by the Legislature. Until this is done the limits of primary and secondary education cannot be fixed."
  And they say that this is desirable, because—
  "The indirect inclusion of the higher education in the elementary schools is injurious both to primary and secondary education."
  Not only does this ruin and drive away the private adventure schools and reduce the endowed schools, founded by our ancestors, to a state of comparative inutility, but there is in consequence of it an immense waste of teaching power. Not only has it that bad effect, but it is sapping the spirit of independence and self-reliance, and inducing even the wealthy to lean upon the rates and taxes, and to endeavour to take advantage of these petty grants in aid of the education of their children, which are made out of the rates and taxes paid by their neighbours. Well, my Lords, this language which I have just read to you emanates from 15 out of the 23 Commissioners, and those conclusions were arrived at after an exhaustive inquiry. Those Commissioners were many of them men
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  identified not only with education, distinguished not merely by their zeal for it, but by the services they have rendered to it; and, perhaps, I may be allowed to say that for the last half-century, I myself, in a much more humble way and on a much smaller scale, have devoted to education a great deal of time and thought, and in proportion, too, of money, more a good deal to elementary education than even to middle-class education. It is, therefore, from no indifference to the subject, from no desire certainly to keep back any poor child who is capable and desirous of profiting by the higher education, but from a deep conviction that the present system is wasteful in practice, inadequate in results, and enervating to the national character, that I have ventured so long to occupy the attention of your Lordships' House.
  THE LORD PRESIDENT or THE COUNCIL (Viscount CKANBBOOK): My Lords, I feel some difficulty in coming to a conclusion as to the points to which I am expected to reply, because my noble Friends have made speeches so discursive upon the whole subject of education, that I hardly know where I should begin and where I should leave off. With regard to the Returns-which my noble Friend asks for, I can only say that, as far as my Department is concerned, we are quite prepared to give them, and, so far as I understand, the other Departments are also prepared to do so, with a slight alteration which has been suggested, and which my noble Friend has acceded to. My noble Friend told us first of all he was not going to enter into the question of elementary education at all, and he did not, I admit, go very far into the question; but my noble Friend who followed him has gone at great length into the point, and has questioned all the different measures connected with elementary education, not only in reference to the present Code, but in regard to the provisions under previous Acts. He has also called attention to other matters in reference to carrying into effect the present system of education, and has ventured upon an assertion, as far as I gather, that it has been stated by Lord Lingen that all elementary education should end at the Fourth Standard. I do not remember ever seeing or hearing such a statement of that noble Lord.
  EARL FORTESCUE: It was mentioned to me. I only say that I have heard it.
  VISCOUNT CRANBROOK: It is immaterial to the argument I do not desire to dwell upon it, but I thought I would ask my noble Friend for his authority.
  LORD LINGEN: If I may be allowed to interpose for a moment, I did not hear the noble Lord make the statement now referred to, but the statement that is attributed to me, to the best of my recollection, I never did make.
  VISCOUNT CRANBROOK: Then we are called upon by my noble Friend to define what elementary education is not, if not what it is. That is a very extraordinary demand, for this Commission, upon which my noble Friend sat so long, with others who were so well qualified to deal with the subject, after sitting for nearly three year a, came to the conclusion that they could give no definition, and they thought they had better throw it upon others to get that definition in some shape which would be satisfactory to the country. Well, my Lords, I heard that it had been defined in a Scotch Act, and, as we know that Scotchmen are said to be so good at definitions, I looked up the Act to see if I could get any assistance there. I found the Scotch were not at all before us in the matter, for they only referred to it as "such education as may be given in the State-aided schools in Scotland pursuant to the provisions of the Education Act." I do not think that carries us very far. Then, as far as we are concerned, we endeavour to lay down a limit; because the Department I am connected with has only to deal with elementary education. Therefore, my Lords, the Code we have produced would be supposed to state how far we think elementary education can be carried; hut after all, if we go into particulars, there is no such thing as can by a hard line be limited as "elementary education." Elementary education embraces, among other things, religious education. Well, that is excluded from the present system of elementary education. It is not necessary for any State-aided school to give any religious education at all. There is no saying what elementary education is, and, there-
  1468
  fore, as far as any definition is required I must decline to make any attempt to give it. No one, however, will suppose that in laying down that you shall teach under elementary education reading, writing, and arithmetic, that merely mechanical process shall be carried out, and that it does not involve anything more. Nor can you say, even if those were prescribed as the limits of what was to be taught, that you could be sure of obtaining only elementary education. I think if you were to introduce Max Muller to teach the alphabet he would be able, in doing so, to give very advanced instruction indeed, which would carry those taught into very far-off regions of science, philological, ethnological, and otherwise. And so it goes on by degrees, so that I defy anyone to say where primary education ends and, secondary education begins. The distinction can, however, be made in a rough way, and the Department has made it in a rough way. My noble Friend wants us, as far as I can see, to say where fees shall begin and where they shall end. If I understand his Resolution I should read it to imply that up to the point at which he considers elementary education to end fees should not be paid, and yet I understood him in his speech to say something of very reverse of that, for he went on to say that beyond that the educational requirements of the poorer classes should be met by exhibitions and scholarships. My noble Friend opposite also would allow those additions to come in. Why is the State to come in and provide exhibitions and scholarships out of the public funds, and not to apply the public funds for the purpose of supplying the same education in another way, if it thinks best? My noble Friends say that voluntary effort has been dried up by what the State has done. Does anyone who is aware of the foundations of scholarships and technical schools, which we see day by day, venture to say that? A gentleman told me the other day that one of the great manufacturers of the bounty had, within about two years and a half, given away as much as £150,000 for purposes of education in this country, and, therefore, I think it is absurd to say that we are stopping all voluntary effort. I object altogether to arguing the question of education on such a Resolution

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  as this. What we want in this country is something concrete to argue upon, not something merely abstract as is this Resolution which has been put down on the Notice Paper by my noble Friend. Then the "wage-earning classes" are referred to. My noble Friend spoke of exhibitions for the children of the wage-earning class. Why of the wage-earning class only? I am sorry to say there are many people in this country who do not belong to the wage-earning class who are just as poor as the wage-earners. Why are not they to be included? It would, I think, be the hardest case in the world that people often almost on the verge of pauperism, but not in the position of labourers, should not be allowed, simply because they are not labourers, to have their children taught in the higher schools by obtaining these scholarships and exhibitions. So that I object altogether to the terms in which my noble Friend has put this Resolution down. I should like also to call your Lordships' attention to this point. We have laid down, as far as we can, in the Code what we think fairly comes within the limits of elementary education. I say at once there is not one of the subjects put down there which cannot be taught in a manner which would carry it far beyond what would be considered elementary. If yon examine the discussions which took place with the witnesses who were called before the Commission with regard to elementary education, you will find that it means one thing in one man's mind and another thing in the mind of another. Therefore, it shades off by degrees, primary education into secondary, without any possibility of drawing a rigid line between the two. Up to the Seventh Standard I consider that we are within the Code forelementary education, beyond that I consider we are outside it. With regard to the point to which my noble Friend Lord Fortescue called attention, it is quite true that the Commission was very anxious to make a distinction between secondary and primary education, but they did not do it. Nor did they altogether disclaim these higher grade schools to which my noble Friend has referred. On the contrary, they regretted that there were no means of extending them. They say on page 169 of the Report—
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  "It is to be regretted that no practical suggestion was made for extending such higher education to rural districts or to populations below 10,000 or 15,000."
  But they also said this—
  "If the curriculum of the higher elementary schools is restricted within due limits, avoiding the ground belonging to secondary education, and if due precautions are taken to secure that promising children of poor parents shall have the privilege of education afforded by the higher schools, then we are of opinion that such schools may prove useful additions to our school machinery."
  What for? Secondary education? No; "for primary education." It may be urged that grants from the Government should not go to them. That is another thing, but I think it will be agreed that children should be allowed to go on, that they should have the opportunity of going further; and Scotland has been instanced, whore they are allowed to go on even to the age of 18, and the advocates for continuing education do not see why that should not be so in England. I feel as strongly as anyone that we have infringed upon secondary education in our educational scheme, and there has been no doubt, in certain cases, some amount of competition; but I would say also that where the School Boards have entered into competition they represented the ratepayers, who have not debarred them from going into that competition. Therefore, whatever has been done in that respect has been done under the influence of the great body of public opinion, and not merely at the instance of one or two persons Mention has been made of Chesterfield. I do not know the case to which my noble Friend refers, but I think it very likely that if a school is of a high character, with a fee payable not exceeding 9d. per week, many people would be ready to send their children there. My noble Friend (Lord Colchester) who has been connected with the Charity Commission told you that they have endeavoured to meet the wants of the country by these scholarships and exhibitions. Your Lordships must remember that these scholarships and exhibitions are only to be won by competition, and they are only obtained by the ablest children. I would venture to call my noble Friend's attention to a point which he has perhaps not studied. It appears that in some of these cases where the Charity Commissioners

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  have instituted scholarships and exhibitions, they have forgotten that if they give a scholarship of a certain class to a poor boy, that is not enough unless they give him maintenance money, and in certain cases, especially in large towns like Liverpool, it has been found that poor children have been unable to hold a scholarship because they have not the necessary maintenance, and they have, therefore, been obliged to give it up; but now as the Liverpool Country Council provide the maintenance, no scholarships are thrown up, showing that there was no disinclination to allow the children to go on advancing in their education, but that it was the absolute necessity of the case which prevented. That raises a very grave question, how far you are to give assistance in these cases from the rates; but that the State should provide for children and undertake their maintenance, as well as to give them allowances in the nature of scholarships, is one of those serious questions which I would rather not go into on the present occasion. My noble Friend has spoken of assisted education in prospect. I must decline altogether to enter into an argument with regard to free, as distinguished from assisted education. I will only now say this, that nothing would induce me to go into that system of assisted education by grants if I thought it would interfere with the independent spirit of parents, or with the system of religious education in the country, which I hope will continue, as the whole education of the country begun upon it. My Lords, I do not know that I should in any way further the interests of education by entering into any further discussion on this question. If I had been addressed by my noble Friend in reference to any particular points of the Code, I should have been ready to give any explanation in my power; but that has not been the case. The discussion has been academic. It has been a discussion on the system. I do not think it has been a useful discussion, that it can serve any useful purpose, or that your Lordships, from the appearance of the Benches, take a very deep interest in it; and, therefore, I will for the present adjourn it, believing that next year we shall be able to discuss the subject with far greater facilities than we have at present.
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  Great changes have been made in our system of education within the experience of my noble Friend, and I am quite sure he will look to the change in public opinion in dealing with any future system of education; but what we have all to do is to look at the matter in the concrete form in which it will be before us next year, and any discussion on those issues will, I hope, be far more valuable than any present expression of shadowy views. I hope, therefore, my noble Friend will not press to a Division this Resolution, which would pledge us to nothing, and could only throw us into confusion.
  Motion (by leave of the House) withdrawn.

  EDUCATION
  "Return of all money voted by Parliament for education in the year ending April last, for

  1. Public education, elementary and technical, in England, Scotland, and Ireland;

  2. Science and Art Department, including agriculture;

  3. Reformatory and industrial schools;

  4. University colleges in the United Kingdom;

  5. Military and naval colleges, academies, and schools:

  Ordered to be laid before the House."—[The Lord Norton.)

  CHILDREN'S LIFE INSURANCE BILL. (No. 97.)
  Select Committee on: The Lords following were named of the Committee:—

  L. Chancellor.

  L. Ker. [M. Lothian.)

  E. Derby.

  L. Poltimore.

  E. Spencer.

  E. Brougham and Vaux.

  E. Harrowby.

  E. Beauchamp.

  L. Kinnaird.

  E. Selborne.

  L. Norton.

  L. Bp. Peterborough.

  L. Herschell.

  L. Bp. Ripon.

  L. Turing.

  L. Clifford of Chudleigh.

  The Committee to meet on Tuesday next, at Three o'clock, and to appoint their own Chairman.

  KEW AND PETERSHAM VICARAGE BILL.—(No. 77.)

    MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS (SCOTLAND) BILL.—(No. 119.)
    Read 3a (according to order), and passed.
    House adjourned at ten minutes before Six o'clock, to Monday next, a quarter before Eleven o'clock.