TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 6679, 30 November 1908, Page 6

TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION

THE QUESTION OP COMPULSORY ATTENDANCE, SHOULD EMPLOYERS BE MADE ■ RESPONSIBLE? AN OPINION FROM PET ONE. *T believe the Wanganui Board has got hold of the right end of the ©tick,'" said the Rev. Alex. Thomson, chairman of the Petone Technical School Board, when invited for an expression of opinion on the proposal© for compulsory attendance at technical oiases, “but i think the compulsion ©hould not be, in the first place, upon the child nor yet upon the parents. I believe the solution of the problem lies in making employers responsible for the instruction of the boys and girls in their employ. It should be a condition of employment in the case of every young person up to the age of seventeen years that he or she, should attend continuation classes, when such were available, on a reasonable number of nights and. receive not only technical instruction, but also tuition in English, mathematics, and kindred subjects. The Government is 'spending an immense amount of money all through the Dominion on technical institutions, and I am convinced that compulsion, in some form, will have to be resorted to before our young people will avail themselves of these facilities to the extent they should. If an employer failed to enforce observance of the condition requiring attendance at technical classes he should be compelled to dismiss the child, who would in this way soon be brought to his bearings." The plan, Mr Thomson pointed _ out, is a timer-honoured on© in Great Britain, where in certain conditions of factory employment the master is under the obligation of seeing that his apprentices are given facilities to attend and do attend classes on certain afternoons. A departure such as that proposed would, Mr Thomson believes, strike a blow at what he alleges is the one great evil associated with the employment of juvenile labour in the colonies, namely the irresponsibility of employers. There is keen competition for boy and girl labour, especially the former, to perform menial tasks such as running messages, delivering parcels, etc. But the boy so employed is learning almost nothing which will make him a useful cittern. When he reaches an age at which he begins to look for his £2 a week and upwards, he is turned adrift, having wasted some of the best years of his life, without a trade or calling, and destined, probably, to swell the army of unskilled labourers." '‘Let the employers of these boys," said Mr Thomson in conclusion, ,r be charged with the responsibility for their mental and manual instruction, and a very different state of things wlil come to pass before many years/