Schools : eighth report from the Select Committee on Estimates together with the Minutes of Evidence taken before Sub-Committee E and Appendices, Session 1952-1953.

  • Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. Select Committee on Estimates
Date:
1953
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Schools : eighth report from the Select Committee on Estimates together with the Minutes of Evidence taken before Sub-Committee E and Appendices, Session 1952-1953. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    17 December, 1952.] [Continued. to The Schools (Scotland) Code, 1950? That in fact has come into full operation, has it?—Yes, it has. Mr. T. W. Jones. 215. The classes are reduced to 45?—(Mr. Rodger.) Yes. There are a few classes, of course, above 45, but that is not in accord with the Code. Miss Ward. 216. That is what I meant. Has the Code come into full operation, or is it still a Code to be achieved as the situation makes possible?—(Sir William Murrie.) I think it has come into full operation, but there are a few exceptional cases where the classes are allowed to be over 45 because there is a difficult situation. 217. Would it be fair to say it is a better situation in Scotland than in England so far as the classes are concerned?—No, because our size is 45 as against 40 in England. 218. That is what is sought without necessarily it always having been put into full operation?—I cannot compare it with England because I do not know how many exceptions to the limit of 40 there are there. I can say there are not very many serious exceptions to the limit of 45 in Scotland. } 219. Could you put a number to the exceptions?—(Mr. Rodger.) There are about 2,000 classes in Scotland above the various maxima prescribed by the Code, of which about 1,200 have over 45 pupils, the pre- scribed maximum for normal primary classes. Mr. T. W. Jones. 220. This is only incidental, but it will be of interest. I am hoping it does not happen in Scotland. I was a school teacher myself some years ago, and had over 60 in my class. I think it was in 1929 the Code stipulated that the maximum should be 49. What the Headmaster did in my case was to transfer the names from my register to another register, so that I was credited with having 49 but actually still had over 60. As Chief for Scotland, ! hope you will make a note of that?—(Sir William Murrie.) Yes, 1 will. Mr. Malcolm MacPherson. 221. With regard to the figures given in paragraph 3 of school places, is there any possibilty of knowing roughly how many new schools that would mean? Or do you not calculate that until the individual localities produce the problem?—(Mr. Rodger.) You mean how many schools does it represent? 222. Yes?—The school is a rather diffi- cult unit to deal with. In Glasgow it is a big thing. In a country area it may be a new room that is required. 223. You know generally the topography of the problem, where most of the demands are going to come from? You would know whether you want big city schools or small rural schools?—Many more city schools than rural schools. The rural problem is not a big one. 224. You can only work in places, I sup- pose, where the problem presents itself practically?—Yes. 225. Is there any possibility of indicating what proportion of those places would be primary and what proportion of others secondary, technical and so on? Would the main building problem ahead of you be a problem of building primary schools?—-The main problem up to now, apart from the raising of the age, has been a primary prob- lem, largely because the post-war bulge of birth rate is hitting the primary schools first, but we are gradually moving into a period where a substantial part of the problem will be secondary. 226. Roughly what part?—About four- elevenths, roughly a third. 227. Can I ask about the continuing deficit that you foreshadow in the figures from 1952 to 1957? I suppose the invest- ment policy might change and that sort of thing—it might not occur—but on the assumption that something like these figures work out, how would that deficit be carried? Where would the pupils be?— (Sir William Murrie.) Could I first make a comment on the deficit itself? I wanted to say two things: one was that since we wrote this memorandum we have again asked the Department of Health what the housing prospects are, because our need depends in large measure on the number of new houses they build, and we have been told that they expect to get on quicker than we had assumed for the purpose of this table on the previous information given by them. Therefore, the figure of 66,900 which you see at the extreme right-hand bottom of the table should probably be about 70,000. That is the first point. The second point I wanted to make was that for the purpose of this table we have assumed that we should go on providing schools at the rate of 1952, the current year. But in our invest- ment programme for 1953 we have pro- vided for building rather more schools, and in our investment programmes for 1954 and 1955 we hope to go on building on a higher level still, each year building a bit more. 228. In spite of the fact that more build- ing resources will be used for housing?— Yes. 229. If housing is going to increase and school building is going to be increased and factory and hospital building not un- duly slowed down, is it going to be a greater strain than the existing resources can carry?—That is the purpose of the in- vestment programme, to adjust these things. All I can say is that we have been given a