EDUCATION IN BRITAIN.

Colonist, Volume LX, Issue 14625, 1 February 1918, Page 2

EDUCATION IN BRITAIN.

DRASTIC GOVERNMENT

PROPOSALS

Addressing a large public meeting at. Swindon, Mr Fisher (Minister of Education) said he was visiting the town, in the first place, because he was invited T>y the trade unionists, and, in the second place, "because he was anxious to interest railway men not only in the general cause of education, but in the special .proposal of his Bill. It is perfectly true (Mr Fisher con-j tinned) that the pressure of Parliamen-j tary business may render it impossible for the Government to proceed with the Bill this session, but you must not suppose that if the Bill is postponed through pressure on Parliamentary time it is therefore discarded. The Government intend to proceed with the measure at the earliest possible opportunity, always, of, course, assuming thai' the complexion of European events permits Parliamentary attention to he bestowed on domestic, lcgislatic: Mr Fisher added that it had been said that, in proposing to keep children in the schools until they had reached their fourteenth year and also "that young people between 14 and IS should have, a little compulsory education in the employers' time, he was introducing an extended form of slavery. Industrial compulsion might, .perhaps, be described as a form of slavery, but educational compulsion was a condition; of larger freedom: He had been immensely impressed by the widespread entluisiasm for education shown by the working classes. This, he thought, was ultimately due to the great shock which the war had imparted to the general body of prejudice aud custom and to a deeper and more- permanent line of reflection which it had set up. With regard to an objection coming from agriculturists, which meant that farming was so occult, so difficult, so beyond the reach of ordinary intelligence that no boy could master it unless he were taken out of school at 12, Mr Fisher said:—We must knock that preposterous rubbish on the head once for all. Depend upon it, there is no industry in this country that lias more to gain from intelligent, well-educated labour than the farming industry, and until ,ivo' get a far higher level of education in our agricultural population we shall never get fanning put on a satisfactory basis. The Bill, he proceeded, was a great social measure designed for the benefit of the children of the working classes. It was a great democratic measure, promoted to give them opportunities which they deserved to have and which they would be able to take. A resolution was passed approving of the Bill and protesting against delay. -Replying to a vote of- thanks, Mi Fisher said that if the Bill did not gc through it would nob he for want oi zeal and effort on his part. No measure had, ever been introduced into the House of Commons which had within it so much potentiality for the improvement of the condition of the people.