A great deal of Monday evening was spent in discussing
a proposal of Mr. Evans's to give every Council of urban districts, " containing not less than twenty thousand inhabitants according to the last census," the same right in appointing the Education Authority for that urban district which Mr. Balfour had conceded on the previous Thursday to municipal boroughs containing that popula- tion. This proposal was resisted by Sir John Gorst, on the ground that already the number of separate Education Authorities is too numerous, and that if these urban districts are let in, the Welsh Intermediate Education Act would be upset, as it was entirely based on the assumption that the Edu- cation Authorities were appointed by either County Councils or county boroughs, and not by urban districts. Sir William Harcourt rallied Sir John Gorst on Mr. Balfour's concession to the boroughs of twenty thousand inhabitants, and declared there was no distinction between them and the -urban districts of equal population, Mr. Balfour replying that there was all the difference in the world in the habits and the traditions which the exercise of municipal rights had formed, but the amendment was ultimately defeated by a majority of 122 (265 to 143). Alr.:Bowles then proposed to make Parliamentary boroughs which are not up to the twenty thousand limit of population, competent to appoint the Education Authority, but was defeated by a majority of 153 (281 to 128), and soon afterwards the House adjourned.
Previous page
