SCHOOL TRANSPORT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26589, 11 October 1947, Page 8

SCHOOL TRANSPORT

ANOMALIES TO BE RECTIFIED

. PRIME MINISTER’S CONCERN Parliamentary Reporter , WELLINGTON, Oct. 10. ' Conveyance facilities should be made available to all children irrespective of the schools they attended, stated the Prime Minister, Mr Fraser, during consideration of the education vote in the House of Representatives to-day. He said the Minister of Education, Mr Mason, was working on the problem and he hoped he would be abie to bring forward an acceptable solution answering trie questions raised by Mr WA. Bodkin (Oppn., Central Otago) about the boarding allowance for children obliged to leave their homes to attend school. The Prime Minister said the possibility of increasing the allowance would' be investigated as the department sought to provide equality of educational opportunity for all children. It had to be remembered, however, that the allowance was on top of the family benefit and that there were certain scholarships and bursaries available. When he became Minister of Education he was distressed time and time again when told that school buses with empty seats were passing children walking to denominational schools. Such a state of affairs was untenable and he had had it adjusted. The Opposition member was quite right. Mr Fraser said, that a situation had since arisen in that denominational schools in some centres had expanded and new ones had been opened. It was unthinkable that children attending these schools should be denied the benefits of school buses taking children to State schools. Whether they went to Anglican, Presbyterian, Catholic, or any other school they were all New Zealand children and should get the benefit of conveyance. Several memhers. M” Bodkin and the Prime Minister paid tributes to the work of the Correspondence School and to the enthusiasm, of the Correspondence School Parents’ Association. Mr S. W. Smith (Oppn., PoKcr.ni mounded a note of rpnfinn that the Correspondence "chool should not be used by the department as an excuse for failing to provide school facilities and transport to schools in country districts. The Correspondence Sdhool, at its best, was not as good as an actual school and if parents were unable to assist their children fully it was something very much worse. Mr Mason said the Correspondence School was not being used as a substitute for actual school facilities.