HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS,

Auckland Star, Volume L, Issue 197, 20 August 1919, Page 6

HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS,

In the opinion or the .Railway Department, the business which takes boys and girls home from school for their holidays is not "essential." We wonder how the. official responsible for thU idiotic decision viewed his holidays when he was a iboy. "Would he have acquiesced lamblike in a. suggestion that, he should kick his heels about the school for two or three weeks instead of enjoying the j delights of home and freedom? The refusal to carry these pupils shows an I extraordinary lack of proportion in that lit puts human convenience and welfare I below the claims of business, and an amazing want of consideration for the interests of the children, the parents and the schools. It is also a cool breach of contract. The railways carried these children to school, and morally, if not legally, they are Tinder an obligation to take them back. The suggestion that schools could postpone their holidays displays an ignorance of or disregard for the complexity and difficulties of school organisation that is almost a3 amusing as it is astonishing. The Department coolly tells *?hool teachers and parents, without much warning, that they must do the best they can without trains, and consequently shift, and often expensive shift, has to he made -with steamer, motor car and coach. Take the case of a child boarding in Auckland and living in Hamilton. To motor right through would be very expensive, :uid ajiy way it is almost impossible, thanks to tho etate of the roads. It would be possible to take train to Mercer and go on by river and car, but a permit would 'be required to get to Mercer, and there are no # permits. Is such a child to be compelled to take the sea route to Kawhia or Raglan, and go overland from one of these out of the way places? ReaJly, no Government department has ever done anything more stupid tlian this, which is about as severe a comment as can be made. "\Ye hope that at the eleventh hour a glimmering of sense will penetrate into the recesses of the Department, and gracious permission to travel will be given to the pupils for whom arrangements have not already been made.