THE PARK CASE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18446, 6 January 1922, Page 2

THE PARK CASE

The Minister of Education (the Hon. O. J. Parr) has made the following statement in Auckland: —“ 1 have read the Wellington newspapers respecting the Park case.. The Petone School Committee, in my opinion, adopted the correct attitude in its. resolve to await the result of a proper inquiry. The main issue now is not whether a particular teacher be innocent or otherwise, but rather whether the Education Board is to hold a secret inquiry and deliberately deny to its members and to the Minister and to the department all records of the evidence taken when a -responsible school committee makes important and considered charges. “The Masterton Teachers’ Institute surely does not consider that the high repute and prestige of the teaching profession will be enhanced by hole-and-corner proceedings, by which an education board may officially Acquit a teacher and at the same time take private undertakings to bo of good behaviour and not repeat offensive conduct, and also arrange privately to remove the teacher though the committee’s ; request for transfer is publicly refused. “Proceedings of the above character condemn themselves, and I am surprised that any responsible organisation should be satisfied with an investigation of so 1 grotesque and unfair a character. In the interests' of everyone concerned, including the teacher, there should be a proper inquiry,, open to the press and public, by a commission entirely independent of local’ or other influences. With a • pretty full knowledge gathered from the report of the. Director of Education as to what took place at the Carterton inquiry, I feel that I should not be discharging my duty either, to the profession or to the public in ignorihg and condoning what has beeil done. ; “Lastly, it, is most important to' remember that the press accounts of this matter are misleading and inaccurate, because the definite charges made by the Carterton School Committee have never been published. The committee's complaints involve many matters of serious importance, quite apart from suggestions of any disloyal attitude in the teacher, and it will be well to suspend judgment until the committee's statement of' the case has been made public.” , •