A Nonconformist Strike.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 40, 2 October 1902, Page 2

A Nonconformist Strike.

The English Education Bi'l, which on its introduction was received with general approval by English Catholics as being on the whole a well-meant attempt to assist and do justice to the denominational schools throu^l.out the country, is having a

protracted and somewhat troubled passage through Committee of the House. The Nonconformists, who have from the first bitterly opposed the measure,, concentrated all their forces on Clause 7, which secured a predominance of denominational managers on the boards of management of the denominational schools. The general control of the schools, it should be explained, is not entrusted under the Bill to this board of management, but to the local education authority. It is this latter body which receives the Government grants, has the spending of the money, the payment of the teachers, the inspection of the school, and the framing of the whole scheme of education in the district. The managers have only two duties to discharge. They have to see that the school is kept in £? pCr *f P air » and the y have tn e right of selecting the teacher. Inese duties seem somewhat insignificant, perhaps, but the right of appointing the teacher is really a matter of prime importance, embodying as it does the one and only means provided under the Bill for securing the denominational character of the schools. Clause 7 provided that there should be six managers, four representing the denomination which owns the school, and two the other ratepayers, and this is the provision which the Nonconformists set themselves to destroy, their suggested amendments all going in the diiection of making the managers a purely elective body. After seven nights of debate the clause was carried at last by the handsome majority of 220 to 98 votes.

The Nonconformists are in high dudgeon at the result of this division. It is pointed out that the Clause really gives the public a closer grip on the denominational schools than ever they had before, but the Dissenters refuse to be comforted. Instead of accepting this well-meant consolation they are urging what the Westminster Gazette calls < the organisation of a great movement of practical protest.' The British Wttkly, the official organ of the Nonconformists, puts still more plainly and explicitly the position they intend taking up on the matter :

' It does not matter in the least to us,' it says, ' how the managers are elected now the proportion has been settled. . . . We may well say that the Government have gained a most inglorious victory in a most unjust war. The war is now carried out of Parliament into the country, and it is absolutely necessary that Nonconformists should know clearly what they are to do. It is upon them that the burden of the fight must rest, and they can conquer Mr Balfour if only they are resolute and united. Once this Bill becomes law there is only one way to resist it. So long as the House of Lords exists, so long as the Irish members are puppets of the Roman Catholic Church, there is no hope. If we allow this Bill to pass and then submit to its operation 30 years may pass before the wrong is redressed. When it is redressed it will not be redressed by Nonconformists. Nonconformists in that case would have lost moral weight so completely that, in all probability, the Anglicans would go on to repudiate the liability they have undertaken for the maintenance of their school buildings. This question should never be closed for a moment. We can keep it open only by making it inoperative. To that end we should be making our preparations as speedily as possible. In other words, the organisation of resistance should not be delayed an hour. . . . Our business is to waken up the county councils of the land, and to let them see what is the business the Government is imposing upon them. It is the business of selling up and imprisoning conscientious Nonconformists. This can be done by a step which our opponents themselves are watching for with undisguised terror — by declaring, and making the declaration good, that we shall never pay the school rate under the new law.'

The progress of the Nonconformist strike against the rates will be watched with a certain amount of interest, but there can be little doubt as to what the final result will be. The English people do not take kindly to any attempt at bullying, and notwithstanding the 'undisguised terror' which the British ]\'eekly fancies now prevails amongst the supporters of the Bill it will be found that the British Government will remain firm and stand to their guns. In due time the Nonconformists will see that they have made a mistake and will retire from the obviously false position they have taken up.