316 



GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. 



also to the Government; the estimates must be 

 voted before Aug. 5, and their discussion must 

 not occupy more than twenty days, the closure 

 being applied to carry in a lump without discus- 

 sion all items not yet voted, unless a minister 

 asks and the house allows three days more, and 

 any vote on account must be disposed of in one 

 day; when a member is named by the speaker or 

 the chairman of committee for disregarding his 

 authority or for abusing the rules for purposes of 

 obstruction or for other reasons he can, on a sim- 

 ple motion put without de-bats, be suspended for 

 twenty sitting days for the first, forty days for 

 the second, and eighty days for the third or any 

 subsequent offense, and the suspended member 

 can not resume his seat for forty days more 

 unless he apologizes in writing, but if a member 

 or members acting jointly refuse to obey the 

 speaker so that force must be used to compel 

 obedience he or they are suspended for the re- 

 mainder of the session or for eighty days on 

 which the house sits, whichever is the longer 

 period; the house can not be counted out before 

 ten o'clock in the evening, though a division 

 when fewer than 40 members are present is not 

 valid. 



A licensing bill dealing with some of the evils 

 arising from intemperance provides for the arrest 

 of any person found helplessly intoxicated in a 

 public place; makes it a punishable offense to be 

 found drunk while in charge of a child; requires 

 a man who has been repeatedly convicted of 

 drunkenness to give security for his future be- 

 havior, otherwise he is confined in jail; makes it 

 a penal offense for the keeper of a public house 

 to sell knowingly to a habitual drunkard or an 

 intoxicated person, and when charged with per- 

 mitting drunkenness on his premises it lies with 

 him to prove that he or persons employed by him 

 took reasonable precautions to prevent drunken- 

 ness; provides that convictions against a licensed 

 place be recorded for the information of the mag- 

 istrates when considering the renewal of the li- 

 cense, and if the justices do renew a license after 

 5 convictions within five years they must report 

 their reasons; places grocers' licenses, which have 

 been freely issued on payment of 10, under the 

 control of the licensing justices; compels all clubs 

 in which liquor is sold to register under stringent 

 penalties and provides for the suppression of 

 spurious clubs established for sale of drink or 

 other immoral purposes; enables the husband of 

 a woman who is a habitual inebriate to apply to 

 a court of summary jurisdiction for a judicial 

 separation with an order for maintenance; a 

 woman whose husband is a habitual drunkard 

 i- entitled to a protection order against him; 

 any habitual dninkard who is convicted of a 

 crime in which drunkenness is an element can 

 not purchase liquor without being liable to ar- 

 rest and punishment, and if a publican who has 

 been notified of the facts sells it to him he also 

 incurs a penalty. The most important clause 

 was that for the supervision of clubs, which must 

 furnish particulars every year of the objects, 

 rules, and number of members, When the mem- 

 bership falls below 25, when the objects and rules 

 are not carried out in good faith, when there is 

 much drunkenness on the premises, when persons 

 are admitted as members without any delay, 

 when the supply of liquor is not under the con- 

 trol of an officer or committee of the club, and in 

 other suspicious circumstances, the club can be 

 stricken from the register. Wide discretion is 

 given to the courts to declare a Hub a sham. 



A bill to restrict labor in coal-mines to eight 

 hours from bank to bank, which the House of 



Commons had agreed to in the previous sessiont 

 by a majority of 12, was rejected by a majority 

 of 1 vote. Another bill of the mining representa- 

 tives to introduce the eight-hour day in coal- 

 mines for persons under twenty-one years of 

 age was rejected by 66 votes, it being coupled 

 with the proposal, which the authors wished too 

 late to withdraw, that no one should be cm- 

 ployed underground who had not entered the 

 mines before he was eighteen. The highest court 

 having decided that trade-unions can be sued on 

 account of any injury they may inflict, their rep- 

 resentatives moved to relieve them of this liabil- 

 ity, which was intended to be fastened on them, in 

 the act permitting their incorporation. The Gov- 

 ernment considered their liability to be sued and 

 the correlative right to sue equitable, and yet 

 could muster no greater majority than 29 to de- 

 feat the motion. 



The Board of Education, instituted on April 1, 

 1900, has control over elementary education in. 

 England and Wales and authority to inspect sec- 

 ondary schools. By the elementary education, 

 act of 1870 school accommodation must be pro- 

 vided in every district for all children between, 

 the ages of five and fourteen. In 1900 the local 

 authorities were empowered to allow children 

 over twelve to leave school for a part or the 

 whole of the year for industrial employment; in 

 agricultural districts children over eleven were 

 exempted during the busy season. Groups of 

 boroughs and parishes form school districts to- 

 elect school boards, of which there are 2,545 in 

 England and Wales, besides 788 school-attend- 

 ance committees in places where there are no 

 board schools. Parents are compelled to send 

 their children to school by these local educational 

 authorities. In the board schools unsectarian 

 religious instruction is given. In the voluntary 

 schools sectarian teaching is allowed. Voluntary 

 schools were supported in the beginning by vol- 

 untary subscriptions. Fees were charged in the 

 public schools until 1891, when Parliament made 

 elementary schools free and voted an annual 

 grant of 10s. for every child in average. In 1897 

 an annual grant of 5s. for each pupil was ex- 

 tended to voluntary schools which conformed to 

 the standards set in the annual code of the Edu- 

 cation Department, the central body which pre- 

 ceded the Board of Education. Of the associa- 

 tions which receive and distribute the parlia- 

 mentary grant among 14,188 voluntary schools, 

 46 are Church of England, 11 Roman Catholic, 11 

 undenominational, 6 Wesleyan, and 1 Jewish. 

 The cost of maintaining the board schools is raised 

 by the school rates levied on all householders, 

 while voluntary schools have to depend partly 

 on subscribers belonging to the religious denom- 

 inations which support these schools in order to 

 give their particular doctrinal cast to the edu- 

 cation of their children and inculcate the children 

 of others with their religion. There were 5,758 

 board schools with 2,201,049 pupils, 11.777 

 schools of the national society of the Church of 

 England with 1,885,802 pupils, 458 Wesleyan with 

 125,727 pupils, 1,045 Roman Catholic with 255,- 

 036 pupils, and 1,079 British, undenominational, 

 etc., with 220,032 pupils. In 1901 only 91 of the 

 schools belonging to the denominational associa- 

 tions declined the parliamentary fee grant which 

 was ostensibly voted for necessitous voluntary 

 schools. 



The elementary schools of England and Wales 

 in 1901 had accommodation for 6,610,416 pupils. 

 20.27 per cent, of the total population, the actual 

 population of school age being 9,608,757, whereas 

 in 1870 the school accommodation was sufficient 



