The Press Tuesday, September 15, 1931. Cost of Education.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 20342, 15 September 1931, Page 8

The Press Tuesday, September 15, 1931. Cost of Education.

It was to be expected tliat the teaching profession would protest against the salary cut of 15 per cent, imposed by the National Government; but it is not easy to believe that the meetings and resolutions described in a, cable message yesterday will have any effect, or that they ought to. Certainly the teachers have better arguments than the reprisals hastily decided upon by two Associations, -which instructed their members to let the basketball loam g'O uncoaebed and the glee club jing without a conductor. Teaehers deserve the best conditions and the highest pay that the State employing them can afford. They deserve to be heard patiently and sympathetically, oven when they become a little sjirill in their own behalf; and they may urge that a reduction of 15 per cent, is severe; especially so when it accounts for more than half of the total saving in educational expenditure, £6,000,000 out of £10,300,000. But when the State had to reduce expendi- I ture largely and at once, the question j was pot whether teachers should sacrifice anything, but how much they j should sacrifice; and the May Committee's report, which proposed 20 per j cent, and made out a good case for it, left no doybt at all that 15 per cent., though severe, is fair and reasonable, Before and during the War, there was no regular scale of payment for British teachers, Rates varied from district to district, and -were often miserably bad; but after the "War the Burnham Committee issued a series of reports, on which were based successive refoxms, with the following result: AVERAGE SALARIES: EMOMENTARY SCHOOLS.

The increases introduced by the BumLam scale were uninterrupted, air though the cost of living bad begun to fall, until 1924, when a 5 per cent, reduction came intq force; aud later, after local authorities had pressed for closer adjustment, a total expenditure of £50,000,000 on salaries was again reduced, but only by £500,000,_ or 1 percept. Though the Bumham scale WBS drawn up when the cost of living stood 165 per cent, above the pre-war Jev.pl, &nd the cost of living has fallen from 170 per cent, above to 45 p§r cept, above pre-war, or has fallen by 40 per cent., teachers' salaries have fallen from their peak by only 6.1 per cent. Had they been adjusted by the Civil Service cost of living scheme, which puts the present cost of living at 55 per cent, above pre-war, the average man'g salary would be 38 per ceati below the Burnham peak and 34 per cent, below the present rate. - In view of these facts, which suggested to the ay Committee, that a reduction of about 30 per cpnt. might' be "justified" and which impelled it to say that "3P per cent, is the minimum " reduction which should tie * made," ft ere appears to be as much mercy as severity in Mr Snowden's 15 per cent. But the May Committee's investigation went mwoh beyond ealarioa, into the difficult problems of administration, State grants and local rating, .fees apd freq places, and so on; and while many of the recommendations here are technical and of little interest in Now Zealand, several remarks are arresting. One is a general reference to the tendency "to regard "Expenditure on education as good in "itself without much consideration of "the results that wo being obtained « for it and of the limits to which it can "be parried without danger to other, "no less vital, national interests." In a Dominion which has steadily increased the per caput cost of education with' cut well understanding why, and cor* tainly without improving the result correspondingly, these words need to bo very earnestly studied. Another remark follows an administrative recommendation ; " Under that system the "element of local responsibility would " bo increased and the Board of Educa"tion would be able to substitute a "general advisory supervision for its "present meticulous control." If an economic committee wants to get rid of bureaucratic arid centralised control in England, it is time to get rid of it in New Zealand, whose Department knows and practises a more " meticulous control" than the Board of Education dreams of.

Certiiluated. UncerAll 3le», Women. tificated. Teachers. £ £ £ 1014 . . 147 103 58 97 337 261 146 241 102S .. 346 270 151 251 }924 .. :ir»7 260 147 248 1930 . . 334 254 143 245 The position of secondary teachers was similarly bettered Graduates. Non-Graduates, Hen. Women. Men. Women. £■ £ £ £ 1914 225 151 165 128 1922 .. 451 343 357 272 J0p3 . . 101 .'159 376 289 1924 . . 442 343 365 282 1930 .. 436 348 ' 330 256