GOVERNMENT AGAIN APPROACHED

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 5, 6 July 1923, Page 10

GOVERNMENT AGAIN APPROACHED

PRELIMINARY GRANT LIKELY.

A very large deputation from the Hutfc and Petons districts waited upon the Prime Minister and the Minister of Education yesterday with the request that there should be no further delay in providing the' Hutt Valley with its promised high school on the site secured at Lower Hutt some' time. ago. ; Mr. T. M. Wilford, M.P., introduced the deputation, and said that the cost of, the building was estimated at £25X00. The school would accommodate 3CO children. The lack of secondary education facilities in the Valley was a bar to progress. Ho urged the claims of his district with every confidence. Mr. E. P. Jlishworth, representing the Hutt Valley High School Board, said that tho board was extremely disappointed. It first placed its claims before the Department in 1917. In that year, the Council of Education recommended the disestablishment of the district high schools at .Petone and Lower Hutt and the establishment of the central high school. The site was probably the most satisfactory in the Valley. Bocause the Wellington colleges were overcrowded the children'of the Valley were being denied their rights to secondary education. Not long ago the Minister of Education promised to do his best. It ™d been noted that an additional ±>60,000 had been voted for education this year, and tho Hutt Valley hoped that it would receive some of the crumbs falling from the table. Mr. J. \y. M'Ewan, Mayor of Petone emphasised the need for a high school P™Per- Petone was now quite satisfied with the site, although the question of transport was bound to crop up later W ft'" ; ?"■ ****•>*> Mayor of Lower -H-utt, endorsed all that had been said and lie urged that the school should be erected at once The fact that so many children from the Valley were attending the already-overcrowded colleges in We!lington should in itself be a strong ar gument in favour of providing a hidi ™°U 1- the, Hutfc- The new school would relieve the congestion in the city me deputation' wanted a straight-out answer, yes or no, to a question: "Will provision be made in. this year's KstiviiW "' a-rT V h]Sh in the Hutt quiKasonS. *hOUSW theh- "*«. CLAIMS CAN BE JUSTIFIED h n wV n"i Ster -f Ed™»ti°a explained ww the site came to be purchased bo lone aj?o,-by Sir Francis Bell/who looked ahead. The children of'the Valley had been given secondary education at the district high schools, and the question that now al -o SO was whether the district • was entitled to a high school proper. ta and estimated that there would be at Least 3CO pupils. The Valley's claims could easily be justified, but "Wellingtons claims for educational purpose's were very large. The Girls' Hi e h School desired £4-5^300, the Technical • Coli e\ 6 a?° ther £20,000. and the Hutt High School Board £24,0C0. He sympathised with the Hutt and would put the mai- ™ Bly. and sc luarely before Cabinet. J.ne Prime Minister said that the position was very simple. Numerous deputations waited upon him, and he did not have enough money to go round.' The demand for expenditure was extraordinary.. The surplus had gone' already, but even then the amount would be a mere drop in the ocean. At Pukekohe there Id'?^^/ 0! 1001 erecteMt;a,Cost oi f^°' ai ld the Puk*ohe people found , iJWW. He would say to the Hutt People: "Go thou and do likewise." rhe request would go before Cabinet witnm. the-; next- fortnight;-and it was quite likely that some, amount by way of an instalment would l>e-provided this year. "We wall do the best we can for you,- but we cannot .promise that you will receive better treatment than anybody else." added the Prime Minister