RESIGN OR BE DISMISSED

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 85, Issue 169, 21 July 1941, Page 7

RESIGN OR BE DISMISSED

TEACHERS AND MILITARY SERVICE PARENTS’ RESENTMENT OF APPEALS (Press Assn.) Napier, July IS. Discontent manifest in the Kaiti (Gisborne) and Ti Tree Point (Weber) districts at the fact that a teacher from each .of the schools had appealed against military service on conscientious grounds was supported by the Education Boprd this morning, when it dismissed Mr. Bernard Tunnicliffe, first, assistant at Kaiti, from its employment and accepted the resignation of the Ti Tree Point teacher, Mr. N. J. F. Senk. At Kaiti it was revealed that the position was that the school committee, and also the Gisborne Returned Soldiers' Association, tool: strong exception to statements made by the teacher when he appeared before the Armed Forces Appeal Board. The committee desired the teacher's suspension. The resolution was carried by the board dismissing the teacher and contained the statement that it was done on the grounds that statements made by him in his appeal before the Armed Forces Appeal Board for exemption from military service were such that in the board's opinion he was not a fit and proper person to be a teacher; that the Kaiti School Committee be informed of the decision; and that if the school committee was in agreement therewith the secretary, shall on receipt of notice to that effect, give notice to Mr. Tunnicliffe of the termination of his engagement on and from a date three months after the date of such notice. “I wholeheartedly agree with these resolutions." said Mr. G. A. Maddison. chairman of the board, “and I have no hesitation in saying that I have no time for those people who take all they can from the British Empire and

are not prepared to defend it when the time tomes. The Empire is founded on the principles of Christianity and freedom and is to-day lighting lor the right of every man to worship God in his own way.” The Ti Tree Point School Committee informed the board that 4 %irents would not allow their children to be taught if the teacher remained and the children would not attend school. The teacher also pointed out to the board that ho had been informed that no one would provide him with board. He therefore asked to be relieved of the position and given a position elsewhere. The teacher had been in communication with the board and hac told the secretary that when he returned from having his appeal heard the chairman of the committee had informed him that the committee had closed the school, the parents had had a meeting, and the children would not attend the school.