502
A HONGKONG EYESORE.
a
more
[December 11, 1909.
If the
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND officers should similar needs arise as it is out of very slender means in order to give quite likely they will in the future-and that their sons an education “sufficient to en- (Daily Press, December 6th.)
they will also be able to find other places able them to earn a living," and we can well more suitable than this for boiling tar when believe that the doubling of the fee would It is satisfactory to the public to have the it is required for repairing Kennedy Road or amount to closing the doors of these assurance of the Government that the areas corresponding to what are known as the other thoroughfares equally distant from the schools to boys of this class. This, therefore, Bank Gardens in Royal Statue Square" will, spot. As far as the Post Office contractor's brings us at once to the question of the with the sanction of the Secretary of State, sheds. and yards are concerned, it was clear Government's responsibility for primary from the statement of the COLONIAL education in the Colony. The Government's be set apart and converted into gardens as soon as ever the Law Courts are finished and SECRETARY that he only dumped his reasons for resolving to increase the fees of can. be well understood. as soon as the Praya Reclamation Office is material where it is because he found these schools
the Government more complaisant and Applications for admission into these dis- vacated, and "those areas can be tidied up." The Hon. Mr. MURRAY STEWART, accommodating than the private land-trict schools, we understand, are largely in excess of the actual number that can be lords from whom he had previously tried to in moving resolution committing
rent a site, but it is not clear how there accommodated, notwithstanding the fact the Legislative Council to an
expres would have been "a very large increase in that large sums of money have been spent sion of opinion that "immediate steps the cost of the building" had the contractor in recent years not only in the better equip. should be taken to abate the nuisance,"
ment of the schools, but on the enlargement explained that this meant "the erasure of been obliged to go elsewhere for the accom-
modation. We may suppose that the of school buildings. As a reference to the the drawing office, the removal of the road- surface factory and an issue of marching contractor had not left the cost of such Blue Books will show, the percentage of orders to the wood yard," but, after listening accommodation out of his calculations in expenditure on education in the Colony has to what we cannot but think was a feeble drawing up the tender which the Govern- been steadily growing, and this, combined and unsatisfactory defence of the existencement accepted, and so the risk of under-esti- with the fact that the applications for mating was his, and not the Government's. admission, to the schools largely exceed the of the nuisance, the hon. member was content to drop the motion on receiving the However, we shall doubtless see this place vacancies that occur, is the Government's assurance of His EXCELLENCY THE GOVER-in time the fitting entrance to the city that justification for raising the fees.
it was designed to be the sooner the higher fees tend to shut out the sons of the NOR that he would give his own personal better-and it should not be forgotten middle and lower class of Chinese from the consideration to the matter, promising that
that the original conception included the Government district schools-which, by the "whatever can be removed will be removed."
replacing of Statue Wharf by a
way, were originally intended to serve as Perhaps it was the fate of the motion no
feeders for Queen's College, but have never less than the rhetorical brilliance of the imposing structure.
fulfilled their mission in that respect—it debate which suggested to a contributor in
does not necessarily follow that they are another column the idea of a " pyrotechnic
denied all opportunities of securing an display," for the simile is complete when we
education on the lines of that given in the think of the thing going up as a rocket and
Government schools. As against 14 Govern- coming down as a stick. We have no doubt
(Daily Press, December 7th.)
ment schools in the Colony, we see that there that His EXCELLENCY will fulfil his promise, We give in another column to-day the are 65 graut-in-aid schools, some of which but if he is guided at all in the matter by views which are likely to find expression presumably would be glad to receive addi- the advice of his officers it is evident from this afternoon at a meeting of Chinese con- tional pupils, for the average attendance in the speech of the COLONIAL SECRETARY vened for the purpose apparently of these sixty-five grant-in-aid schools is only that there is little improvement to be formulating objections to the intention of 3,780, as compared with 2,144 in the fourteen expected for some time to come--until, in the Government to increase the fees at the Government schools. What the Govern- fact, the Post Office and Law Courts are com- district schools of the Colony. The fee at ment is striving to do is to improve the pleted. No dates were mentioned, but the the present time, we understand, is $2 per standard of education in these district Hon. COLONIAL SECRETARY had no doubt month, and the intention is to increase the schools, and the fact that in the last budget that "the time will not be so very long fee in some schools to $3, and in others to
a sum of $800 was set apart for scholarships distant now." Having regard to the length $4, for new scholars, and later on to make the to Queen's College from the district schools of time already occupied in putting up these
new fees applicable to old scholars if circum-
is indicative of that intention. buildings, there are many people who are
stances are held to justify the step. Against inclined to believe that a year is but as this increase it is urged that the parents of yesterday in the sight of the Government. the boys attending these district schools- The foundation stone of the new Law Courts situated at Saiyingpun, Yaumati and Wan was laid November, 1903, and it is doubt-chai-belong mainly to the middle and ful if we shall see the building completed and ready for occupation in 1910. The nuisance has been existing far longer than this for the foundations took a very long time to prepare As to the Post Office, it was mentioned by the
COLONIAL SECRETARY that the contract for the superstructure was let in August, 1905, that it was a contract
EDUCATIONAL PROBLEMS IN
HONGKONG.
lower classes; and that two dollars a month for each child is fully as much as they can afford for education. To raise the fee by fifty or a hundred per cent., it is urged, would practically mean a denial of education in these primary schools to numbers of such hitherto have enjoyed the
children as
The suggestion is made in the statement which appears in another column that the Government is seeking to induce the mana- gers of the grant-in-aid schools to increase the fees at these schools also, and that the Government may find in a school's refusal
an
excuse to reduce its grant. This can hardly be accepted as a fair statement of the Government's attitude in the matter. It is, at least, we imagine, a very inadequate presentation of the facts. Budget statement H. E. The GOVERNOR
In his last
in grants under the Code continues to increase and reaches this year the large sum of $65,000. HIS EXCELLENCY said he pro- posed to examine this question during the year, and we infer from the statement appear- ing elsewhere that, the examination is in
for four years, but will probably not be privilege, to the benefit alike of themselves drew attention to the fact that the amount and the community. Families are not completed in less than five. And when usually small among the Chinese, and even these buildings are
completed, what though a reduction he made when a family guarantee does the COLONIAL SECRETARY'S contributes more than one pupil to a school, speech contain that the whole area now
education must form a very considerable occupied by the extensive range of matsheds, item of expense in the domestic budget the wood and stone yards, etc., will be where the revenue side shows an income of converted into the promised garden plot? not more than $25 to $30 a month, a sum In the past few years the plot has been that may be given as the average wage of needed to accommodate part of the staff of the skilled artisan in Hongkong. A clearer the Public Works Department, also to
progress.
If the object of this grant of a fixed sum in respect of every child in a school is to enhance the efficiency of a school, there is doubtless much to be said in
house at one time the Police and at another idea of what this means to the Chinese criticism of the basis on which the grant is
the Volunteers. And SIR HENRY told the Council that he knew of no other site where either the Police or the Volunteers could have been conveniently housed. So the argument seems to be that this site is absolutely necessary to the Govern- ment in all similar circumstances. For the purposes of a defence to the complaint, it was, perhaps, as good as could be found, but we trust that when once the plot is appropriated to the admirable purpose for which it is designed, the Government will find that there are other convenient sites for the temporary accommodation of its
working-man may be obtained by contrast- made; for if the same grant is made for an ing his position in the matter with that of the infant as for a boy or girl in the higher labourer and the artisan in England. Where standards, it is quite possible to have a education was not given free in the clemen-school in which efficiency is sacrificed to tary schools in England the fee commonly revenue by the admission of a dispropor- charged was 2d a week. Here in Hongkong, tionate number of infants. Doubtless, the with the fee at $2, the artisan and labourer result of His EXCELLENCY's examination of has to pay at the rate of 10d per week for the question will be made public in due each child, though it takes him a month to course, but in the meantime we may be earn what the English working-man earns in quite sure that if the is any prospect a week. If it is a fact that the boys attend of a school's grant bing reduced, the ing these district schools are the children of Government's action will be found to be the middle and lower classes, it becomes at supported by more solid and satisfactory once apparent from this contrast that the reasons than such puny vindictiveness as is parents are already making heavy sacrifices suggested by the statement that
if the fee