The London School Board Budget, produced on Thursday by Sir
Richard Temple, shows that the expenditure is still advancing at the rate of 4100,000 a year. In 1889.90 the outlay was 41,702,969, in 1800-91 it was 41,813,646, and in. 1,891.92 it will be 41,960,478, or, speaking broadly, two millions sterling a year. Meanwhile, the number of children educated " has not sensibly increased." The expenditure, when the State grants have been deducted, and the expenses of collection added, amounts to a rate on London of a shilling in the pound. These figures are very heavy, but they would cause no complaint if Londoners believed they got full value for their money. They doubt whether there has not been extravagance, perhaps jobbery, in those branches of expendi- tare which nobody understands,—the purchase of apparatus, for example, the cost, of yearly repairs, and till lately the payments for law expenses. The Board seems to need a Joseph Hume who will woiTy each Committee for explana- tions of its accounts ; but the committee system of itself fosters expense. There is no individual responsibility, nobody whom the electors can remit to outer darkness.
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