THE PETERITE
I
ol. LXIV
OCTOBER, 1973 Edited by D. G. Cummin,
No. 389
J.P., M.A.
EDITORIAL
The Labour Party has been at it again : another plan for education; or rather, the usual plan by which nobody does better than anybody else, but presented by a different spokesman, sometimes known as the Shadow Minister for Education, a title that would surely have delighted W. S. Gilbert. Perhaps he would have given us an opera called 'Equality" or "Labour in vain;" Commentator: In politics he made a small sensation As Shadow Minister for Education; He planned to stultify the British Nation By stopping any chance of elevation. Chorus of Dolts: Here comes, with Axe, and Policy sinister, Our Comprehensive Shadow Minister. The Plan is heavy with progress; nearly everybody will be able to start being educated at the age of three and go on to at least eighteen, although at present this formidable prospect will not be compulsory. There will of course be more and better teachers; well, more anyway. parents, while losing almost any right to decide how their children are o be educated, will have a small voice in the running of the schools, because the Plan says : "We shall make governing and managing bodies of schools more representative of parents, teachers, and, where approriate, pupils—and give them more power." Predictably the Direct Grant hools are again destined for destruction, and, says the Plan, "Our aim to abolish fee-paying in schools and to bring all children of compulsory chool age into the national education system." This is heady stuff, cloth cap and all; and to bring every child into e state system is a bold move towards equality; but is the intention to aise the general level? If not, it is an aim without principle. If it is, en we must look at it with care. The Plan says of the independent schools: "the Newsom report's judgment that they are a divisive influence in the life of the nation is incontrovertible." Maybe; but at least this implies that by some the quality of education is thought to be better in such schools. The teachers are not better people than other teachers; they are not superior beings; but the education they provide is probably thought to be better because they enjoy the freedom of movement that is traditionally a part of teaching in independent schools, which is often why they seek to teach in them. If you are going to bring every child into the state system, you are going to bring in every teacher as well. Thus you will run the risk of taking from the present independent school teacher one major factor 1
