INDIGNANT EDUCATION BOARD

Evening Post, Volume XCV, Issue 89, 15 April 1918, Page 7

INDIGNANT EDUCATION BOARD

In Saturday's issue of The Post there was published a Pres3 Association telegram from Napier, stating that the Hawkes Bay Education Board was very indignant over the decision of the Education Department to re-erect the Napier Main School on the old site, and also over the delay in dealing with the matter. The Minister >of Education (Hon. J. A. Hanan) informed a Post interviewer that, as he had promised to meet a deputation from the Napier Education Board on the subject on Tuesday next, he preferred to wait until then before fully-commenting on the statements in the telegraphic report of the board's meeting. Meantime, he merely desired to say_ that in its original proposal for the reinstatement of the school destroyed by fire, the board recommended rebuilding on the old site, intimating that the various other areas offered were not so suit-able. "This," said the Minister, "is the site to which objection is now being made by the board." To acquire another site which was under consideration, and erect thereon a new school, would_ have involved at least £17,000, and, in the present abnormal circumstances, Cabinet would not approve of so very heavy and extraordinary an expenditure for one school. His colleagues knew that the criticisms levelled against him were unwarranted.