NEW SCHOOLS WANTED

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 690, 15 June 1929, Page 13

NEW SCHOOLS WANTED

MINISTER LISTENS TO COMPLAINTS HAMILTON WEST AGITATION (From Our Own Correspondent) HAMILTON, Friday. While in Hamilton today the Minister of Education, the Hon. H. Atmore, received several deputations. Mr. Atmore told a deputation he would consider the question of providing additional accommodation at Hamilton East School, which has an attendance of 005, and accommodation for 524. To a request for a new school at Te Awamutu, the old one having outgrown its usefulness, Mr. Atmore said the department had spent £1,139 on a 10-acre section near the station for a school site. This site was unsuitable and should never have been bought. Tho sum of £2,000 was asked for the section suggested as a new site, and a new building would cost £30,000. There were already three sites held by the department in Te Awamutu, and he desired to know what prospects there were of selling those that were not required. The Minister said a new school must be built, and when full information was available as to disposing of the present sites and buying a new one at a reasonable price, he would further consider the question. A new school for Innesfallen, near Ohaupo, was sought by Mr. Lee Martin, M.P. The Minister said the children of the district would be provided for either by a consolidated school or by a small school in the locality. The vexed question of the removal of the Hamilton West School to another site was brought before the Minister by a deputation from the Hamilton West Parents’ Association and the school committee. They urged that the school should be kept where it is, and quoted adverse medical reports regarding the other site. The Minister said the health of the children must be the primary consideration and he would have reports prepared concerning the school and the two sites.

Reasons why the school should be removed were given by a deputation representing the Hamilton Technical High School, which waited on the Minister in support of a claim that the site should be set aside for secondary education purposes.

Mr. F. A. Snell said the technical school was badly in need of a playing area, which at present was practically nil. The Minister again said he would have a health report prepared with regard to the Palmerston Estate site, and when that was received he would make a decision. He thought the present school had a few years of life yet, and it must be allowed to live out its life.