EDUCATION IN ENGLAND.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 3486, 7 June 1884, Page 3

EDUCATION IN ENGLAND.

At a meeting of the Select Committee of the House of Commons on Education, Science, and Art Votes (Administration), the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Chair,Mr Mnndella an M.P., Vice-President of the Privy Council, in the course of evidence which he gave, said “ Having observed that the Education Department was deprived of the means of knowing how the schemes of the endowed schools worked, and that the Charity Commissioners themselves had no reports and had no knowledge of how those schemes worked, he said there should be an annual examination of all the endowed schools. He could not think anything more important or more instructive, or that would have a better tendency to promote middle-class education wnich at present waa in a chaotic state, than to have those reports. The value of the public schools would be enormously enhanced if the Department had the power of inspection, and he thought it would be a great advantage if all educational institutions, museums, and galleries, were under the Education Department, He was of opinion that Ireland would benefit if the Minister of Education were Minister of the United Kingdom. As to the constitution of the Department, his opinion was and that of all Vice-Presidents, that there should be a Minister of Education. To the present system he would prefer one similar to that of the Board of Trade and other departments. The head of the office should be the Minister of Education, and ho would almost of necessity be a member of the House. He should certainly have a seat in the Cabinet, and to this point ho attached the utmost importance. The Minister of Education should be responsible do fare as well as defacto for the votes for the Universities, the public schools, and iho endowed schools, the national galleries in the throe parts of tho United Kingdom, and all the outlying science ( votes. He was aware that 41 per cent. 1 of the whole population of Ireland

above five years of age could not read or write, and he regarded this state of things after 50 years national education in Ireland as most unsatisfactory. There was nothing like it in Europe, but he could not hope for any real education in Ireland unless they had a compulsory aystem.