PROTEST MADE

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 139, 9 December 1931, Page 11

PROTEST MADE

EDUCATION EXPENDITURE

A protest against "the multifarious inspectors travelling around the country and this voluminous report" was made by Colonel T. W. M'Donaid at a meeting of the ■Wellington Education Board to-day, when members .were considering the agricultural inspector's report. Colonel M'D6nald said that there was waste in all Departments- of State, and ho thought that tho time- had arrived, when there should be an investigation into the whole question of travelling, inspectors, and examiners. Tho chairman (Mr. T. Forsyth) said ho agreed that we had become overinspected. "It's become a new science, this question of inspecting," he remarked, with a laugh. . -~ .■ Dr. J. W. M'llraith (senior inspector) pointed out that where there was an enormous amount of money at stake there must bo some check on it;. New Zealand spent four millions on. education, and it could not be spent without some guarantee that it -was being spent well. . . Mr. C. IL Nicholls complained against tho amount of money being spent on seeds. He quoted one. item, ' 2oz of swede seed for the training college, and said that that amount would plant far more than was necessary for the college. In reply to a question, Dr. M'llraith said that it might be that as teachers had been trained for so long in agriculture the work might come to be.regarded in the same way as any. other subject. ■