THE EDUCATION BOARD AND MINISTERIAL FAVORITISM.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1319, 12 October 1880, Page 2

THE EDUCATION BOARD AND MINISTERIAL FAVORITISM.

(by telegraph.) Dunedin, October 12. • The Education Board, at a special meeting to-day carried the following resolution : —"This Board having been informed that out of the vote for school buildings of L 50,000, the Minister for Education has only allocated Otago L6OOO, it desires to protest in the strongest possible terms against this allocation, as being an injustice -to Otago.- "The -Board desire to draw the attention of the Minister to the fact that it has under its charge one-fourth of all the schoblcliflSren in the Colony, and is therefore entitled to a very much larger proportion of the rate ; also that, for the last three years, it has been placed in a much worse position than any other Board in the Colony in regard to sums allocated to it for school buildings. Further, the Board considers the present system of providing and distributing funds for school buildings extremely unsatisfactory, and is of opinion that power for raising sums necessary for school buildings by local rates should be conferred by Parliament on local bodies, and that such sums should be supplemented 'pro rata by the Central Government.'' This last resolution was carried with a distinct' understanding that a sufficient sum should be voted by Parliament in the first place to put school districts on an equal footing. An opinion was unanimously expressed that if justice was not done to the district the wisest course for the Board to adopt would be to resign, and throw the responsibility on the Government.