Government by “experts”

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32941, 13 June 1972, Page 16

Government by “experts”

The election of a 17-year-old girl to the Masterton Secondary Schools* Board has been noticed, variously, with surprise, with delight, and with concern. The parents, who elect board members to represent them, made their choice; and that is that No age limit in the Secondary School Boards Administration Regulations restricts the nomination of candidates for election, so the discretion belongs to the electors. If they are pleased by the results, well and good; if they are disappointed by the results they must bear with the outcome and vote accordingly at the next election.

The Minister of Education (Mr Pickering) should not necessarily accede to representations to prevent the election of pupils to secondary school boards. Teachers may resent their appointments, conditions, and even their authority being ruled upon by pupils. Teachers are often being reminded that young people are being inadequately prepared in many respects for adult life; they might understandably wonder how it comes about that pupils are deemed to be prepared to govern their teachers. Under the present rules, this is up to the judgment of the parent electors, , who are the spokesmen for their children at school. It may be argued that pupils themselves have greater prescience than their elders about their educational needs to prepare them for later life. This view is also questionable; for it is noticeable that those who claim authority when young are not quick to yield, a few years later, to any claim to superior foresight on the part of their junior successors. The Masterton election has helped to revive teachers’ claims to membership of school boards. The Education Act makes no provision for teacher representation; the regulations go further and disqualify any employee of a board from membership. Were teachers enabled to sit on boards it might be possible to exclude them from business personally affecting colleagues in a school; but the definition of “affecting.” would be. difficult. There is a much more important reason for caution about changing the rules. Although no-one may be at once a State servant and a member of Parliament there are precedents enough for public employees being enabled to share in the government of their own employment No law prevents a local government officer from being a councillor—though most electors would quickly sense the dangers of his dual role. The most serious reason for caution lies in the “ professional ” and the “ expert ” ceasing to be the adviser on making policy—as a headmaster invariably is in resnect of a school board—and becoming a maker of policy. Government by experts and policy-making by professionals are to be avoided. At least the presence of an expert in government should be at the choice of the ordinary elector and not an automatic right accorded to the expert or specialist Teachers, like other specialists, have their own area of authority and management. Extensive control over schools is already exercised by departmental professionals, to whom teachers and their organisations have access. If teachers and other employees are no longer to be disqualified from board membership, parents who elect them should be aware of the change in control that they are inviting.