FROM LAND TO EDUCATION.

Press, Volume XLIX, Issue 14562, 13 January 1913, Page 6

FROM LAND TO EDUCATION.

According to a cable message published this morning, the British Liberals hare made an important and very significant tactical move. The land question is not to be the great issue of tho immediate future, but first place in tho party's programmo of social reform is to be given to education. Lord Haldano stated in a speech at Manchester that the Government had decided that education was the most urgent of social reforms, and that "a great "step forward must be taken." Mr Lloyd George is going to "throw him- ' self into the question with the whole- " heartedness shown by him in con"nection with the Insurance Act," and tho whole education system is going to be recast from top to bottom. In the same speech Lord Haldane made it clear that tho land question was to be shelved indefinitely. Great caution was necessary in dealing with the question ; it was still in the enquiry stage, and "the moment for making somo "suggestion had not arrived." The significance of this is apparent when one remembers that some months ago preparations were being mado by tho Radicals for a great land campaign. Tho people's attention was to be

! diverted from tho unpopular Insurance ; Act to an attrartive scheme cf land ■ taxation, and Mr Lloyd George was to lead off the campaign at a big meeting ;01 agricultural labourers. That moet-

ing has been abandoned. Some prominent Liberals declared openly that they objected to a further raid on the land, and no doubt a good many wealthy .supporters of tho party ex-prrs-rd similar opinions to the party ohiifs privately. So the great land campaign has been deferred or abandoned, and instead there is to be conccntrat'on on edtieation. A curious point about Lord Ualdane's statement is that he makes no mention of the very mainspring of this move, the question of religious instruction and the power of the Establ'shed Church in tho system of elementary education. It cannot )>o doubted that tho mam motive fbr the Government's decision to recast the education system, is to remove thp grievance of the Nonconformists ivith respect to religious teaching i 1 schools and religious tests for teachc-s. Nothing contributed to the overwhelming Liberal victory in H'JOG more than the opposition among Nonconformists to the Balfour Education Act, but although a Liberal Government has been in power ever since, that Act, thanks to tho House, of I/ords, is still in force, nnd passive rcsi ten; are still active This religious question has been overshadowed by other controversies during the last few. years, but Nonconformists have been restive, and Ministers know quite well the value of tho Nonconformist vote. Moreover, while Nonconformists demand that their grievance be removed, many of them look askance at the land policy of the extreme Radicals as leading to a general attac_ on property. As for the remodelling of secular education, thero is room for many reforms, and details of the Government's policy will bo awaited with interest. The question is so huge, however, that it cannot receive adequate treatment unt'l some of the other principal policy measures are out of tho way.