The Otago Daily Times. TUESDAY, JUNE 12, 1928. DUCATIONAL AUTHORITIES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20432, 12 June 1928, Page 8

The Otago Daily Times. TUESDAY, JUNE 12, 1928. DUCATIONAL AUTHORITIES.

The Minister of Education spoke feelingly, it would appear, but none the less explicitly, when, in addressing the Council of Education last week, he gave expression to the view that there are too many educational authorities in the Dominion. It will probably be the layman’s inclination, born of his contemplation of the number of bodies which exercise some degree of educational power in the community, to endorse that opinion. The very numerous educational conferences that are held during the year afford some evidence bearing on the question, though they are, of course, by no moans all of a departmental character or representative of any official authority. The tendency, however, where a considerable number of different forces are pulling in this direction and that in the educational arena, may well be, as Mr Wright suggests, to place difficulties in the way of the exercise of effective Ministerial control. Tho present Minister of Education has been credited with a desire to abolish the Education Boards. Apparently he is now content to suggest that the number of these bodies might be advantageously reduced. It is not incompatible with a conviction that centralisation is not the best educational policy in practice to agree that there may be an unnecessary, and possibly somewhat embarrassing, measure of educational government, from one source and another, in New Zealand. The activity in educational stocktaking cannot escape notice. Never was there a time when there was more discussion of the educational ideal and a greater disposition to upset or reform the existing educational practice. With those who contend that education is being starved in New Zealand and argue that, on whatever purpose money is spent, so long as it is an educational purpose, it is bound to be well invested, it is difficult sometimes to have patience. Tho Minister is no doubt entitled to sympathy in his effort to keep the educational machine running smoothly and efficiently without bothering too much in the meantime about “ improvements.” But if, as he suggests, there are too many educational authorities, and he is disposed to apply the pruning knife, possibly a fair beginning might be made with the Council of Education itself. The value of this purely advisory body has not been very convincingly demonstrated. Even some of its members, as well as tho public, may be disposed to speculate upon the justification for its existence. One of their number remarked, at the meeting of the Council last week, that the public did not know of its existence, and even hinted that the Minister himself must, when he was setting up the Syllabus Revision Committee, have forgotten that there was such a body as the Council. It was brought into being under the Act of 1914, and its duty is to report upon methods or developments in national education which, m its opinion, might be desirably introduced into New Zealand; upon any matters concerning the provision of facilities for education in this country, and upon the co-ordination of the work carried out by the various bodies controlling education ; and upon any other educational matters referred to it by the Minister. But these duties come manifestly within the scope of the duties of the Department of Education itself. In the circumstances the Council of Education may well appear to be something of a luxury and a contributor to the overlapping and excessive distribution of educational authority of which the Minister complains.

The warning which the Dunedin Licensing Committee' issued yesterday to the licensees—“ quite a number ” ot them—whose conduct of their premises during the past year was described as " unsatisfactory ” might have advantageously been expressed in stronger terms. The committee, through its chairman, said it wished to stress the necessity of strict compliance with the law and declared that it would take every step, so far as lay in its power, to ensure such a compliance. A general warning of this character, not directed to any licensees in particular, is of very little value. A remark from the Supreme Court Bench a few weeks ago implied a belief that there were few hotels in which illicit trading is not practised. If this is actually the case and if it is within the knowledge of the Licensing Committee that it is the case, the circumstance is not adequately met by a warning from the committee phrased in such mild terms as might almost suggest a desire to avoid hurting the feelings of any licensee. The committee possesses powers which, if it would only exercise them, would enable it to put a stop to a great deal of the illicit trading or, if it is necessary to use refinements of language, the *• weakness in the matter of supervision ” that is reported to it. If it is alive to its own interests, “ the trade ” itself should be the first to recognise the need for respecting the law. A trade that depends for its very existence upon the votes of an observant public incurs a considerable risk if it disregards the law by which its operations are regulated. Those licensees against whom “ a weakness in the matter of supervision ” may reasonably be charged may actually be imperilling not only their own business but also the business of all concerned in the trade. Any suggestion that we are not a superstitious people will hardly survive a perusal of one of the features of the marriage statistics of the Dominion. Tt is unquestionably a mere superstition which attaches some sinister significance to a Friday or to the thirteenth day of any month and leads to an avoidance of those days for the beginning of an enterprise and of a wedded career. But it is a superstition which powerfully influences the selection of a wedding day. There were 10,478 marriages last year in New Zealand. Very few indeed of theso were celebrated on a Sunday. In none of the past fivo

years were there more than 57 Sunday weddings, and the average number was 47. For this there are intelligible reasons, religious, sentimental, anti social. But, while the number of weddings on five out of the other six days of the week were in every instance more than 1150 and in the case of Wednesday, which from some cause or other seems to be popularly regarded as a specially lucky day, mounted up to 4354, there were only 494 marriages on a Friday. The record of last year in this respect was a repetition of that of all preceding years. It is curious to observe, indeed, that during the past five years, at least, there has been very little change in the order of preference of wedding days. Over 40 per cent, of the marriages were in each year celebrated on a Wednesday. Next in order were the two days next to Wednesday, with a slight preference for Tuesday over Thursday. In 1923 and 1924 Monday was favoured rather more than Saturday, but for the past three years Saturday has been next to Thursday in order of preference. Willie, however, a Friday is so disliked .that only 4 per cent, of marriages are solemnised on that day, the 13th day of the month is positively shunned. The general average of marriages on this day is 29 per annum. Last year, however, the total number celebrated on the 13th of the month was only 17—out of a total of 10,478.

There are other interesting facts to be extracted from the marriage statistics. It is observed by the Government Statistician that the war and the influenza epidemic of 1918 had a great influence on the number of widowed and divorced persons who remarried. A large number of young widows was left by the war and the epidemic carried on a great many husbands and wives, and it was only natural to find that, because of this, a considerable increase would be shown in the number of marriages of widowers and widows. Out of every 1000 persons who were married in New Zealand in 1914, there were 11 divorced persons and 51 widowers or widows. The corresponding figures for last year were 30 divorced persons and 57 widowers or widows per 1000 marriages, in 1918 the proportion of widowers or widows who were re-married reached as high as 81 per cent. Widowers seem to have been attracted to re-marriage more strongly than widows. Only 2812 widows re-married in the Dominion in the past five years, as compared with 3592- widowers. Out of 10,478 mairiages there were only 1837 in which the bridegrooms were younger than the brides, and in 79 per cent, of these cases the brides were from one to four years older than the bridegrooms. There were 22 cases in which the bride was older than the bridegroom was by fifteen years or more, the extreme case being one in which the bride was thirty years the senior. The average age ot the bridegrooms last year was 29.92 years and of the brides z 6.25 years. The popular age for bridegrooms—the age at which most marriages are celebrated—has been 25 and that for brides 21 during each of the last three years. No bridegroom last year was of an age below 1 1 years, but there were 77 brides whose age was less than this, one of them being between 14 and 15 and twelve of them between 15 and 16. The older the contracting parties the greater, it would seem, is their disinclination to a public wedding. More marriages of bridegrooms of :<5 years and over were celebrated last year before a registrar than before a minister, and nearly 20 per cent, of all the marriages in the year were conducted in a registrar’s office.