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80. You know there is a feeling of great dissatisfaction on the part of many teachers?—l know there is with some. 87. There is a feeling that promotion does not go as it should? —1 know there are such cases. bB. Is it not possible to overcome the appearance of that by providing that where there are certain applicants for positions, the highest qualified men shall get them? —The teachers put forward a scheme at the annual meeting in Auckland, but the difficulties are very great in carrying such a thing into practice. They said that if a teacher by an assessment of marks got more than four marks more than another teacher the Boards should appoint him in preference. It might be possible that such a teacher might not be suitable for a particular school, and any rule like that, unless it took into account local circumstances, is bound to break down. 1 could give jou examples. 1 know several cases in my own experience when 1 was an Inspector of the Board in iNorth Canterbury. A teacher who had been an engineer was very suitable for a town school, but he had never lived in the country, and was totally unfitted for a country school. Such a teacher might stand four marks higher than others and if there were an automatic system like that proposed the Hoard would have to appoint him to the country school, for which he was unsuited, and the town would suffer a loss, while the country school would not be benefited. 89. That man, unless he had a chance in town, could never hope for promotion 'I —He would have to wait a little longer. Whether he had hope of promotion or not, the first consideration is the school. 90. There have been several schemes put before the Department by conferences of teachers and individual teachers and members. Have you taken these schemes into consideration in framing • this Bill at all? —1 read them all. 1 did not mould it on them. They all mean interfering with the power of local appointment, and i am so thoroughly convinced that that is a healthy condition that I have never suggested to the Minister, or any one, any scheme that would interfere with it. 91. Mr. T. Mackenzie, J Mr. Baume has opened up a very wide aspect with regard to our system of education. Is it not possibly correct that men are required to go through certain positions before being eligible for others? Let us suppose there is a vacancy in one of our large city schools at the present time. The first assistant applies, and influence is possibly brought to bear on Boards and Committees in order that this first assistant may get, the appointment, very much as if a first officer of the Union Steamship Company desired to become captain of the steamer of which he had been first officer. Would it not be possible in your scheme to grade your teachers and schools so as to require that the teachers should go through certain positions before being eligible for others? You might say that a man before he could take Grade 10 must have become a head teacher of a school like Grade 6, or be first assistant in some other before he could take the head-teachership in Grade 8? What is causing this dissatisfaction alluded to is that the first assistant in a large school will obtain a higher position over teachers who have been headmasters in schools of lower grades? —I think it would be possible to do that in regard to headmasters. But to that extent you would tie the hands of the Boards. It seems to me there are much better ways of doing the same thing. One is to leave it open to let the Boards confer among themselves and come to some mutual agreement as to what their policy should be in that respect. If you were careful, you might perhaps do something in that direction without tying the hands of the Boards too much. 1 tried to do that in what I laid before the Teachers' Salaries Commission, right down to the bottom of the scale. lam now convinced it is a mistake to try to do it right down to the bottom, but I believe it would have been possible to make it work out quite well if done at what I call the top. But I think the arrangement could be just as well made by agreement among the Boards themselves as by a statute, and it would have more advantage in that it could be altered if it did not work. I see no particular reason against it. The only question is whether it should be done by the Boards themselves or by a statute. I think the Boards should do it. 92. Mr. Hogg.\ Have you any representations to make respecting the provisions of the Act relating to compulsory attendance? —I think we are very easy about compulsory attendance in New Zealand. 93. Have complaints reached you from Education Boards, or from other sources, that the attendance is very irregular owing to exemptions?—We have had correspondence with regard to it, but not very specific. I think the law relating to school attendance is very liberal and easy. New Zealand is not an easy place to work educationally. Under a uniform law we might be easy in the towns and unduly severe in the country. 94. Have you heard of the action taken in New South Wales by the Government to appoint a Commissioner to deal with this question ?—I believe that they have done so, but I know nothing more specific about it. 95. Do you know the state of affairs in such countries as Germany, Switzerland, France, and even in connection with the London School Board?— The London School Board has an average attendance of only one more unit per cent, than ourselves. There is not much to choose between us and them; but Switzerland has an average attendance of 97"2 per cent., and even that average attendance means counting as absences times when children are allowed to stay away in order to reap the harvest, and so forth, when we should have shut our schools. 96. The reason I ask is this: At the meeting of the Wellington Education Board yesterday it was stated that in New South Wales the compulsory attendance was made without any exemptions whatever, except in cases of illness or where a satisfactory reason could be shown that the child was unable to be present. It was also stated that, as a result of inquiries made by the New South Wales Commissioners, it appeared that in Germany, Switzerland, France, and the London School Board the compulsory attendance was made regular without any particular time off. In New Zealand we are allowing one-fifth of the time—one day in the week the child can be absent— and the complaint is that great advantage is being taken of this, and the children and teachers