mischievous. There could hardly be a greater drawback to the progress of education than to discontinue their publication, and if the reason for so doing was to save the expense of printing, then considering that the Reports of these Inspectors were the best guarantee that existed for the proper expenditure of an amouut of £620,000, it would be the most absurd penny-wise and-pound-foolish kind of saving that was ever proposed. With regard to the discontinuance of the tabulated return of schools, he was now given to understand that the right hon. Gentleman opposite would abandon that part of the new regulation. From the circular letter of June last, it appeared that the Reports on individual schools would no longer be printed, but communicated in manuscript to the several schools. This was indeed a retrograde step, in the nine, teenth century, to give up printing, and return to manuscript. In conclusion, this circular would retard the progress of education, and would establish a bad precedent for other official Departments. The right hon. Gentleman concluded by moving, have to report that the measures of the Committee of Council were generally approved of. Such observations came appro priately from the Inspectors as impartial and independent witnesses, but would be ill-placed in a Report composed by the head of the department. One advantage of these Reports had been that they had not combined to promote any one particular plan or method, but they gave the authentic impressions produced on different minds by experience in different parts of the country, and were very practical both in their facts and inferences; but if these Reports were to be superseded by an aggregate Report, this multiform character would be lost in the general impression of the Minister of Education. A condensed summary, moreover, prepared in the office, would not be so interesting or so much read as the personal narratives. The heads of other departments did not profess to assume any such functions. It was true that the Poor-law Board did make a statement of statistical facts and figures, but they did not make an abridgment of the Reports of the Poor-law Inspectors, and it would not be desirable that the Home Secretary should assume an authorship with respect to the Reports of the Inspectors of prisons and factories, instead of presenting them as they were written. If the Committee of Education undertook to select passages from these Reports for publication, they would be regarded as responsible for whatever they inserted, just as in countries where a censorship of the press existed, everything which was allowed to appear was presumed to have the sanction of the Government. It was alleged on the other side, that the Reports of the Inspectors were not in all respects such as ought to be published, but the Committee of Council had it in their power to lay down the strictest rules with regard to the character and nature of the Reports they desired to have sent up to them. By the original agreement between the Committee of Council and the Bishops, with respect to the National Schools, it was agreed that the Report of the Inspectors should be shown to the Bishop of the diocese in which the schools were situated; so that the Bishops must still see the Reports of which Parliament was to be deprived. For these reasons, he urged the expediency of allowing the original Reports to appear unaltered and unabridged. The withdrawal of publicity from the tabulated Reports would be most That an humble Address be presented to Iler Majesty, praying that the General Reports of Her Majesty's Inspectors, when prepared in accordance with the instructions of the Committee of Council on Education, should continue to be laid upon the Table of the House unaltered and unabridged; and that the detailed Reports, tabulated according to districts, should be printed and made public as heretofore." Question proposed. MR. ADDERLEY said, he thought he should be able to remove from the mind of the right hon. Gentleman a great deal of misapprehension upon which this Motion was based. The Motion was somewhat different in form to what it was when first entered upon the notice paper. He had told the right hon. Gentleman that his only objection to the Motion in its original form was, that it would call on the House of Commons to affirm that it was right to do that, which, in fact, was actually being done at this time. The right hon. Gentleman, in consequence of that remark, had introduced the words, "unaltered and unabridged;" but he (Mr. Adderley) could not consent to that addition. There were two kinds of Reports referred to in the Motion, and it was necessary to distinguish between them. There were, first, the general Reports of the Inspectors, which were now presented by the Education Department to Parliament; and there were, secondly, the detailed Reports garded as an improvement, had been proposed by the Committee of Council in the mode in which those Reports were to be presented to the House. The right hon. Gentleman seemed to misapprehend the intention of the Circular to which he had re on individual schools, which had never was found to be absolutely necessary to been presented to the House of Commons, place a limit on the expenditure for that but printed by the Department and gratu- purpose. It had now been arranged, howitously distributed to the schools. With ever, that these tabulated summaries of regard to the second kind of Reports, there individual school Reports would be printed was no difference between the right hon. and sold at cost price, besides the immeGentleman's views of what ought to be diate manuscript communication of each done, and what was done by the office at to its own quarter, which he considered a that moment except that a great deal very material improvement. But with remore was done by the office than he asked. gard to the general Reports of the Inspectors, The Reports of the Inspectors on india considerable alteration, which he also revidual schools were not only printed in the manner that was now asked, but a great improvement had been added. Heretofore, it had been the practice to keep the Reports on individual schools in the office until the conclusion of the year, when they were all put together in a sum-ferred, if he supposed the Committee of mary, printed, and published in one volume, and distributed. The consequence was, that each Report did not reach the School Committee to which it referred in many cases until some twelve months after the inspection. He, himself, as manager of several schools could say from his own experience, that in this way the Reports, whether for praise or blame, were rendered absolutely useless. Who would care whether an Inspector's Report stated that a school had been well or ill managed twelve or fourteen months previously, when, perhaps, the master had since been changed, and the conduct of the school had become materially improved with the lapse of that time? It was essential to the efficacy of these individual school Reports, whether for censure or approval, that they should follow immediately on the inspection of the school; and this was now carried out, so that every school within a short time after the inspection, received the sentence passed on it by the Inspector. The tabulated summary of these returns at the end of the year was certainly also useful for the purpose of statistical comparison, and convenient for Members of Parliament and others to refer to as a general statement of the condition of schools throughout the different districts of the kingdom. It had, after securing the more important immediate returns, only been a question of expense, and he was happy to say he had obtained the consent of the Treasury to this tabulated statement being printed, and sold at cost price to anybody who wished to obtain it. It was well known that in May last, a Treasury Minute was issued restricting the number of copies of Parliamentary Reports to be gratuitously distributed; and, indeed, it Council undertook to digest and assimilate these different Reports, and make a combined Report, for which they themselves would be responsible. He (Mr. Adderley) agreed that it would be very unwise in any Department to take such a course. What the Committee of Council had undertaken to do was to address the whole of the Report from themselves to Her Majesty in Council, as the Poor Law Reports were addressed, treating as an appendix, but in the same type, a volume of Reports addressed by the Inspectors to the Committee. The individuality of the Inspectors' Reports would not be lost, they would not be digested or assimilated, but at the end of the Report of the Committee of Council would be printed all such extracts from the Reports of the Inspectors as might be considered to come under its proper head. The Inspectors were very able functionaries, and nothing should be done to diminish the value of their Reports; it was therefore important that the Reports of each Inspector should not be published in extenso without extracting all irrelevant matter from it which did not come properly into a Report. The actual facts embodied in each Report would be given ipsissimis verbis, but the Government should not undertake to print any disquisitions upon moral philosophy or other irrelevant writing in which the Inspectors might choose to indulge. In his circular of 1851, the Marquess of Landsowne complained of the extravagant length to which these documents ran, and requested that the Inspectors should be more concise in their observations for the future. The same circular stated that the bulk of the volumes interfered with their usefulness; that they were not convenient media through which to advocate particular theories or schemes of education; that what was wanted was not speculation or inference, but data and facts for the information of Parliament. Similar directions were issued in 1852 by Lord Lonsdale; and their effect had been to confine the Reports within more reason able limits, and to render them more germane to the subjects they had to treat. The Report which formed the climax of abuse rendering this interference necessary, was a volume of 211 pages, including five maps, and travelling over every possible subject, with disquisitions on the difference between the Celtic and Saxon races. That Report alone cost £100 in printing. There was a Report in the very last volume on the beneficial effects which would be produced by education upon the habits and morals of the people, on the prevalence of a taste for sensual indulgences, and other equally irrelevant matters. Now, it could not be denied that the heads of a Department were responsible for the character of the papers which they presented to Parliament, and the improvement now proposed in the mode of publishing these Reports would render them far more useful and more practically available as Reports. It would be a mischievous principle to lay down, that the heads of each Department of the State should be compelled to print indiscriminately at the public cost everything sent in to them by their subordinate agents. What would be thought if the Inspectors of Prisons included in their Reports to the Secretary of State lengthy dissertations upon moral philosophy; or if the Sanitary Inspectors sent in disquisitions upon homœopathy, hydropathy, and every medical theory extant? The right hon. Gentleman's Motion was based on an erroneous idea of the functions of these educational Inspectors. They were very able men, capable of performing an important duty, but if they were treated as colleagues of the Committee of Council, that body would be regarded as dispersed over the whole country, would become exposed to pressure and solicitation from all quarters, and would be considered as putting out feelers to encourage every nostrum and experiment, and would become pledged or implicated in a most multifold and mis chievous manner. The tendency was already dangerously great towards yielding to the pressure from rich and stirring quarters where education would advance of itself, and therefore Government should not undertake the task better done without them. Voluntary action would be superseded and overlaid, while the public grant would be wasted where it was unnecessary, and with. held from places where it was most wanted. There was one point worthy the attention of the noble Lord the Member for London. If the system of national education increased, as it was to be hoped it would, until it attained three times its present dimensions, the number of Inspectors would, of course, have to be proportionately augmented. In that case what would happen if the country was put to the expense of printing everything without distinction which the larger staff, numbering, as the noble Lord had himself proposed, as many as eighty, sent in for publication? In regard, then, to the second or tabulated Report, the right hon. Gentleman must acknowledge that all which his Motion sought was already obtained, and a great deal more besides. As to the general Report, a greatly improved form was to be adopted, of which the House would soon have a specimen before it. If it should then be dissatisfied with what the Government had done, the House would have nothing more to do than to agree to a Resolution requiring on its own responsibility that the Reports furnished to the Executive should be published by them in extenso as first sent in. MR. M. GIBSON said, that although there was not so much difference between the two right hon. Gentlemen who had just addressed the House, as at first appeared, they were very far from being agreed. It appeared from the statement of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Adderley), that with reference to the Reports of the Inspectors on individual schools considerable improve ments had been introduced, inasmuch as the Report on each school was communicated in manuscript to that school almost immediately after the Report was made, so that the promoters and managers had the opportunity of attending to any observatious which it might contain. With respect to the tabulated statements it appeared that instead of being given gratuitously they were now sold. He was disposed to advocate economy, but certainly he should not have complained if the Government had continued that gratuitous distribution, and thought it was too much the habit to make a parade of economy in these little matters. The principal question before the House was the manner of dealing with the general ment would not think it necessary to divide the House on the question. MR. BLACK said, he thought that the Government were acting wisely in endeavouring to lessen the expense of printing the Reports. The printing of one Report had cost no less than £5,000. Loads of blue-books were sent into the library every year, but the size of the volumes was alone sufficient to deter any man from opening them. He had had some experience in giving instructions to authors as to the limits within which they should write, and he knew that if he fixed it at ten pages it would probably be fifty. He was cer Reports of the Inspectors, and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Hertford contended that they ought to be given entire, and in the language of the Inspectors. Now the Government, as he understood, proposed to make a sort of digest of these reports, and submit them as Reports from the Committee of Council to Her Majesty in Council on the subject of education. Now he infinitely preferred receiving the Reports of the Inspectors in their words and in their own form, without any change on the part of the Government. [Mr. ADDERLEY: The Reports are to be given in the words of the Inspectors.] But the Report was to be given in the shape of ex-tain condensation would raise the value of tracts, and not entire. He had a great dread of the system of extracts, because passages might be excluded which if inserted, would give a different meaning to the Report on the whole. He was willing to admit the force of the objection that Inspectors were apt to expatiate and speculate on general principles rather than to give the facts that came under their own observation. But the Committee of Council had the remedy for this evil in their own hands, for the Inspector was bound report according to his instructions, and all that was now asked for was, that the Reports made according to these instructions should be submitted in their entirety to the House. The words of the instruction were very precise: "Her Majesty's inspectors shall make their annual Reports with the utmost conciseness which may be sufficient to show the state and progress of education in their several districts, as it may have come under their own observation in the course of their inspection since the period when their last Reports were made." Now, if an Inspector indulged in speculations, all the Committee had to do was to call his attention to his disregard of their instructions, and desire him to amend his Report. But when a Report was accepted by the Committee of Council it ought to be submitted in that form to the House, and to that extent he agreed with the righ: hon. Gentleman the Member for Hertford (Mr. Cowper). The power of altering the Reports of the Inspectors might be abused, and if the right hon. Gentleman pressed his Motion to a division he would give it his support. The words of the Motion were, that the general Reports of Her Majesty's Inspectors, when prepared according to the instructions of the Committee of Council, should be laid on the table. Surely there could be no objection to that proposition, and he trusted the Govern the Reports, and would give hon. Members some chance of understanding the subject of them. MR. PULLER said, it was impossible not to sympathize with the horror expressed by the hon. Gentleman who had just spoken of those voluminous blue-books with which their shelves were encumbered and the greater part of which it was quite impossible for any one to read, but he could not help expressing his regret that while the Government were loading the table of the House with Report upon Report they should have selected for a special display of their economy those particular Reports which were studied with so much interest and attention by the promoters of schools all over the country, and which had conduced so much to that great improvement which had taken place in our national education during the last ten years. Those Reports were of the highest value. The Inspectors themselves were a body of some forty or fifty men of the highest intellectual attainments, picked men from the universities, men who had already won their spurs in the fields of literature and science, and whose opinions were entitled to respect not merely on that account, but still more for their practical knowledge of the subject of education, attained by visiting all the best schools in the country. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Adderley) asked, "Were they to be put in the place of the Committee of Council?" Most assuredly not. Still there could be no doubt that if upon any particular educational question the united opinion of the Inspectors was opposed to that of the Privy Council, the country would endorse the opinion of the Inspectors in preference to that of the Committee of Council. The House no doubt remembered how last year the Chancellor of the Exchequer had expatiated on the gradual increase of the educational grant, a grant which then amounted to more than £600,000, and would probably this year be larger still. Well, these reports of the Inspectors were the only means which Parliament had of ascertaining how the vast sums of money so granted for education were spent, and whether the nation had money's worth for the expenditure thus incurred. He would ask, therefore, if the House was prepared to allow this information to be previously passed through the mill of the office which distributed the money, and whether instead of having the evidence undiluted and unaltered, it would be content with passages picked out here and there, and dovetailed together by the Secretary to the Privy Council-a man of great ability, but who had not had the same opportunities of personally inspecting schools himself? Would the House be satisfied if that process were to be gone through with any other important question -our foreign relations for instance? He ventured moreover to say that if the new system were continued-if instead of feeling that they were working as it were under the eye of the public, with fair opportunities of obtaining credit and distinction-if their work was well done, the Inspectors were in future to be the mere drudges of the Privy Council Office with no reward for their labours but their pecuniary stipends, it would not be possible to obtain the same class of men to act as Inspectors, and so the country would be deprived of the advantage arising from having its system of education superintended by those who, from their abilities and acquirements, were most competent to perform that duty. This was evident from the able remonstrance which had been drawn up by Mr. Brookfield, and which had been signed by almost all the other Inspectors. He would not detain the House by dwelling at any length on the other subject comprised in the Motion of his right hon. Friend the Member for Hertford, he meant the detailed Report of individual schools, as the right hon. Gentleman the Vice-President of the Committee of Council had consented that those Reports should in future be printed as heretofore and sold at cost price. At the same time he must say, that the selling them at cost price would not, in his opinion, be nearly so useful as the gratuitous distribution which had been allowed heretofore. It was not merely the three or four shillings which the manager VOL. CLII. [THIRD SERIES.] of a school would have to pay for the book, although, considering the difficulty which existed in many cases of supporting a school, every additional item of expense would be a hardship; but the having to write for the book, and to get a postoffice order to pay for it, would be practically so many obstacles to that general circulation of these Reports, which, in his opinion, was most desirable for the progress of education. VISCOUNT PALMERSTON said, he hoped that the Vice President of the Education Committee might be disposed to yield to the reasonable appeal which had been made to him. If he understood him correctly, the main difference between him and his right hon. Friend is in this, that the right hon. Gentleman proposed that the Reports of the Inspectors should assume the shape of a Report from the Committee of Council to Her Majesty, embodying under certain heads such passages in the general Reports of the Inspectors as the Committee might think useful for public information; whereas the right hon. Member for Hertford and those who agree with him are of opinion that the whole of the general Reports ought to be presented, either in the shape of an appendix to the Report of the Privy Council, or, as heretofore, as an independent body of Reports to be laid before Parliament. He was sure the sagacious mind of the Vice President must see that there was an important difference between selections made from Reports and the publi cation of the Reports themselves. With the best intentions different persons took different views of so wide and complicated a question as that of education, and those in the office of the Committee of Council who had the task of selecting passages from the Reports, while meaning to give the best and truest information to the public, might choose their extracts according to their particular opinions, and involuntarily omit passages which many Members of Parliament might deem of great importance. It was much better, therefore, that the Reports should be given in full, than that they should appear in the shape of selected extracts classed under different heads. But the Vice President had given a picture of the helplessness of the office to which he belonged that almost excited compassion. The Inspectors, it seemed, pour down upon the Committee of Council whole volumes upon moral philosophy, the history of races, the question of sensual enjoyments-surely a strange matter to 2 A |
