140 LOCAL TAXATION 



Even the Government recognised the hardihood of expect- 

 ing local authorities to submit to this imposition, and employed 

 a clever political subterfuge to put it on to their shoulders 

 without themselves finding any part of the cost. They intro- 

 duced an Elementary Education Bill, which, while it imposed 

 new duties and new expenditure on local authorities, did 

 propose financial assistance from the Exchequer, which Mr. 

 McKenna (President of the Board of Education) said, in 

 introducing the Bill, would amount to 1,400,000 a year, 

 towards the cost incurred by local education authorities. 

 Adding this to the grants then being distributed, the whole 

 amount would equal a grant of 47s. per child per annum. 

 This same Minister definitely promised a deputation from the 

 County Councils' Association, on llth February, 1908, that, 

 if the Bill passed, the result of the financial proposals would 

 be such that the expense of medical inspection would be met 

 out of public funds, and that it would be possible for County 

 Councillors to meet their ratepayers with a substantial reduc- 

 tion in the rates. This Bill was read a second time on 20th 

 May, and referred to a Committee of the whole House. No 

 further progress was attempted before the recess, and it was 

 adjourned to the Autumn Session. The compulsory order of 

 the Board of Education regarding medical inspection was 

 put into operation on 1st July, and, having the promise of 

 Mr. McKenna before them, local authorities incurred all 

 the necessary expense and provided all the necessary machinery 

 for working it, confident that the Government would honour 

 their obligations. Having accomplished their object, no 

 further effort was made by the Government to provide the 

 funds. Their Education Bill was withdrawn, mainly owing 

 to the strong public feeling evinced against those clauses 

 that touched on the religious aspect of the question. 



To the uninitiated this may appear a perfectly reasonable 

 excuse for the Government's withdrawal of their Bill. So it 

 may have been ; but it affords no excuse for their attempt to 

 pass an unpalatable measure by holding out a tempting bait 

 to ratepayers. A purely financial question of this sort should 

 have been dealt with in a Finance Bill, not in a measure 



