five in the Church of England school and eleven in the Roman Catholic school, and in the same county, in the parish of Wool, there are sixtyfour in the Church school and twenty-four in the Roman Catholic school; or if it be answered that in both these cases the Roman Catholic school will cease to be recognised as under thirty, and therefore these parishes become single-school parishes, take in the same county the two Church schools of Winforth Newburgh or the two Church of England schools of Whitchurch Canonicorum, one of fifty-two, the other of fortythree scholars, neither of which will be transferred. I submit that if we are really to secure a public system throughout the country and to allow private schools for the dissentient residue we ought, for every Voluntary school throughout the country, to have in the hands. of the Board of Education, not later than the 1st of April 1909, a statement of the desire to maintain the school, the fee proposed to be charged, and the number of parents desiring the school with the number of children who would attend. The Board of Education should then declare that the remaining number of children are those for whom public accommodation must be provided, and a reasonable time should be allowed, and efficient means taken to secure that the places shall be provided for that number.

This question of school provision is no trifling one. It is notorious that in many districts, especially in Lancashire, there has been great reluctance to provide school places, and that the existing school places are very bad, and yet the Local Authority has pleaded for continued recognition of bad school buildings. Does anyone suppose that in such towns as Wigan, Southport, Bury, Preston, there will be any alacrity on the part of the Local Authority to supply new and commodious schools, and that, if the demand for public school places has to come from the parents, the expression of that desire will not fall far short of the real want? It seems to me essential that the expression of desire should come from those who want to stay outside the national system, not from those who want to be included in it. Another matter in which the Bill fails to make adequate provision for a public right is in the matter of free education.

When the free Education Act was passed, schools accepting the Act had to make their schools free throughout if their fee did not exceed ten shillings a head. The present Bill repeals the free Education Act, and merely gives an individual parent the right to demand free education, but it leaves to the Local Authority the right to charge fees, with the consent of the Board of Education. This permission has been already grossly abused in Liverpool, and it is not desirable to substitute the right to ask for a free place which may be offered in some particular school and not taken in any school, for the present right which includes all the schools of the country with very insignificant exceptions. The free Education Act secures free education from three to fifteen. That Act is the only one which gives a statutory

right to attend the elementary school from three up to fifteen. The Cockerton Judgment showed a strong disposition in the judges to cut down the limits of elementary education, and but for the free Education Act we might have had fourteen as the upper age of attendance. The grants which it is now proposed to pool include the grant in lieu of fees, and it seems to me essential that, as to public elementary schools, the law should provide that they shall be free from three to fifteen to all scholars attending. It might be allowed in special cases or higher elementary schools for the Board of Education to permit a fee if one-third of the places were reserved free; but even this is not desirable, and at any rate the general elementary school system should, as it now is, be preserved free by Act of Parliament.

I have dealt with the object of the Bill to secure throughout the country a national system of public schools available for all, and free, and have pointed out certain amendments which seem desirable and even needful to secure this.

I now turn to the State-aided schools. If due precautions are taken that the schools are recognised, not so as to exclude public schools, but to supplement them in the interest of those who desire schools ecclesiastical rather than civic in their tone and management, I am willing to accept and support the proposals of the Bill, with some modifications which do not affect the principle but rather give better effect to the object. The National Union of Teachers and others object to the lowering of education, the prejudice to teachers, the injustice to scholars. I may notice two or three objections which I do not believe judge correctly the intentions of the Government, and as to which amendments might be readily accepted in the Bill to give statutory security for the objects desired.

(1) The superannuation of teachers. I see no reason why certifi cated teachers should not be entitled while in State-aided schools to continue to contribute to the national pension system and have all the benefits of it. They will be serving in schools under the inspection of the State, and we are assured that the Board of Education will maintain an equal standard of efficiency in them. Moreover these teachers will probably pass to and fro between the public elementary and the State-aided schools.

(2) Scholars in these schools should be entitled to compete on equal terms for scholarships and bursaries offered by the Local Autho rity for the encouragement and promotion of pupils to higher education. Similarly they should be entitled to compete for admission to higher elementary schools.

Personally I see no reason why they should not be allowed to attend classes in manual instruction, cookery, and similar subjects which are managed and controlled by the Local Authority.

It has also been said that the managers of State-aided schools should have statutory security for their grant.

On this point, which is most important, I agree, but I think the grant should vary with the conditions of cost. It would be fair to assure to the State-aided schools as a whole a parliamentary grant equal to 478. a head, but this grant might well vary between school and school.

There are four principal conditions which affect the cost of maintenance :

(1) The general cost of maintenance in the district, which varies. very much, from 41. 68. a head in London to 21. 88. in Preston, 21. 48. in Flintshire and Pembrokeshire.

(2) The size of the school; a school of under 100 must be more costly than a school of 250 to 300.

(3) Any endowment belonging to the school.

(4) Fees charged to the scholars.

I think if the State-aided schools are as a whole assured 47s. a head, it would be fairer and to the advantage of those which have the heaviest burden if the grant varied, say between 21. a head and 21. 148. a head according to the conditions 1, 2, 3, 4.

The question of endowment is specially important. It might be made a condition before admitting any school to recognition as a State-aided school that the trustees should submit a scheme for the application of any endowment. Some schools have very large endowments, some quite trifling ones, but after allowing for the repair and improvement of the building the endowment should be utilised, and if large enough to provide for the repair and the margin of cost beyond the State grant, the balance might with advantage be applied to the further education of the scholars.

Thus, in Bedford, the Harpur trust has a school in three departments very richly endowed, with 1062 children in average attendance, and though there are few foundations for elementary education so wealthy, and none on so large a scale, yet the question of endowments cannot be left on one side in considering applications to conduct schools outside the framework of local public management.

The scale of grant adjusted after considering the circumstances of the school should be laid down by the Board of Education in a code, and might be varied according to experience every three or five years. Subject to such regulations as these I think, further, one or two conditions might reasonably be imposed on the managers.

(1) No rent or interest on building should be allowed to be included in maintenance.

(2) The accounts should be subject to the same audit as the accounts of the Local Authority, and should be published and accessible. (3) A certain margin, say 10 per cent., should be required from the managers beyond the parliamentary grant, but fees (paid voluntarily as they would be) and endowment should be included in this 10 per cent.

(4) The whole of the school income should be expended on the school.

Many conditions which at present attach to the receipt of grants disappear under the Bill, quite apart from the present partial supervision of the Local Education Authority.

Thus the new State-aided schools are not subject to a conscience clause. They have the right to refuse admission to any scholar. They may require attendance at a particular church.

So long as the secular instruction lasts two hours and the school is open for 400 attendances they have a free hand for closing on Saints' days, for altering the hour so as to allow of attendance at church in what otherwise would be school hours.

They may generally manage their school much more freely than they can at present, and for all this freedom they are guaranteed a grant which on an average is 3s. a head higher than the grant suggested for Public Elementary schools, and they retain the local subsidy of exemption from the payment of rates.

I have said that their grant will be 3s. higher than that promised in the memorandum to Public schools.

An examination of the grants earned by various groups of authori ties shows that the administrative counties received in 1905-6 about 21. Os. 9d. a head, and in hardly any case would the new grant by scale equal a rise of 4s. a head.

The only counties which, according to the returns of 1905-6, would get more than 4s. a head were the West Riding, Cardigan, Carmarthen, Carnarvon, Denbigh, Glamorgan, Merioneth, and Monmouth. Those would under the new scale receive 10,300l. more than the 4s. scale, or about 8d. a head additional. In the case of the poor, specially aided districts, thirteen districts would take under the scale sums between 4s. and 6s. a head, and twenty-five districts would by the 48. grant gain nearly 41,000l. In the case of the county boroughs other than those receiving special aid fifteen would gain over the scale by the 48. minimum grant, thirty-eight would take under the scale additional grants ranging between 4s. and 6s. a head, and nine would take more than 6s. a head under the scale and would lose 82001. These boroughs are Portsmouth (4001.), Burton-on-Trent (600l.), Croydon (500l.), Brighton (13001.), Hastings (3001.), Hull (10007.), Bradford (28001.). Leeds (10007.), Newport (3007.). Of course the later figures of 1907-8 will somewhat vary these calculations.

London is the only place that makes a substantial loss. They will get at 6s. additional on their present numbers, 114,0007. less than the scale would give them.

But taking all England and Wales the total grants were very little over 21. a head. The counties get more on account of the small population grants, and because in small schools infants are paid for on the scale of older children.

It cannot then be said that a statutory grant nearly 3s. a head higher than the grant to Public Elementary schools is a niggardly allowance to those who are to be allowed such enormous rights of private management; especially if higher elementary schools and special instruction are thrown open to the scholars of the State-aided schools. Let us now turn to the financial proposals for Public Elementary schools.

The scheme of grants-4s. a head more than is now paid, and a possible 68. a head more-is a material aid to the ratepayer, though he would be a bold man who prophesied that this additional grant would not be swallowed up by the growing expense.

But it must be observed that here financial aid is being removed from the sure base of a parliamentary right to the shifting base of departmental decision as settled by each year's code. No doubt any settlement proposed in connexion with the present Bill would hold good perhaps for eight or ten years, but an annual vote is not the same thing as a section of an Act of Parliament. At present, at least a pound a head is secured by legal enactment, and it would not be unreasonable out of a contemplated grant of 44s. or 45s. at least which in one or two cases may grow to 46s., that there should be a secured grant of 21. The margin would be quite enough to enable the Board of Education, by withholding the whole or part, to enforce efficiency and compliance with statutory duties. Moreover, if onefourth is the right proportion as a minimum of cost to be borne by the locality, that proportion might be specified in the Act. The Act of 1870 prescribed that parliamentary aid should not exceed one-half of the cost of maintenance. The total in this Bill from which a fourth will be taken includes interest and repayment of capital. In 1905-6 the total expenditure for all England and Wales, under Part III. of the Education Act, 1902, was about 19,200,000l. (excluding administration expenses); of this three-fourths would be about 14,400,000l., and a grant of 21. 5s., which is rather more than the proposed grant, would yield less than 12,000,000l. The present figures of cost are no doubt higher than those given both per head and also the totals, so that there is little fear of a Local Authority being able to work the schools at less than a fourth from local income. But Local Authorities may be afraid that some future code may require a third instead of a fourth, and the insertion of the proportion in the Act would give confidence to them.

There is, however, another point which needs attention. Clause 5 of the Bill repeals the provision of the Act of 1902, which enables the County Authority to charge not less than a quarter or more than a half of the cost of loans for elementary schools on the county as a whole, the residue being charged to the subordinate area supplied. As the County Authority has the sole control of the plan, site, and cost of a new school, the proposal that the whole cost of interest and sinking