XN000022-1974-10-16 — Page 89

Wednesday, October 16, 1974

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this sort of vision that pays off, for there is an enormous

requirement for housing which cannot possibly be satisfied

in full for many years to come, if ever.

EDUCATION

In elaborating proposals for your approval in the

Public Works Programme and Housing Programme your Government

has attempted to combine tenacity of purpose on broad

objectives, with provision for realistic flexibility.

In

the White Paper on Education tabled today you will see the same

approach. The White Paper is a statement of policy and the

measures described in it represent an enterprise of some

magnitude which will prove a challenge and a stimulus to all

concerned. The goal is to provide a 3-year secondary course

for all in the shortest time possible. If certain assumptions

are fulfilled this could be as early as 1979 a much shorter

time than that envisaged in the original green paper. By

that date it is judged possible to train the extra teachers

required, but it certainly would not be possible to provide

the number of new schools necessary if secondary schools were to

be uni-sessional, because the money is not available to build

schools for all the places required in the time, nor, if it were,

would it be physically possible to do so. The objective is

provision of assisted secondary education for all, but unless

many children are to be denied this for many more years there will

have to be a transitional period during which the school

buildings we have and can construct are used much more

intensively than at present.

The technique for this,

/for which