CO_1030_1459_HONG_KONG_CONSTITUTIONAL_DEVELOPMENT_1963_1965 — Page 98

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CRITICISM OF PROPOSALS IN MARSH SAMPSON EDUCATION REPORT

AT PRESS CONFERENCE ON 22ND JUNE 1965 by G. S. KENNEDY-

SKIPTON ESQ. HON. SECRETARY LABOUR PARTY OF HONG KONG.

Both His Excellency the Governor and the Financial Secretary

in their Budget Speeches were significally silent in the iniquitous proposal in the Marsh Sampson report to cut teachers salaries heavily, although the report as a whole had been openly lauded by the Government

when published. So it looks as if those cuts are in danger of being

approved. To label them iniquitous, you may say, is begging the

question. Well here are the actual rosulta in detail of the Marsh

Sampson proposals for teachers' salaries. Pages 62-66 of the report. indicate that in a primary school the certificated teacher of five

years' experience will get $750.00 per month on a scale of $500-$1,100, instead of his present $925 (about) on a scale of $675-1165.

This is

to be offset (p.66) by one chance in five-and-a-half of getting a responsibility allowance or better for superior work (only 5 out of

In a small a staff of 28 in a 24-class primary school will get it.)

school, chances are about 4 out of 15, better, but still thin.

Only

if he is one of the few who get it, is the 5-year, certificated man

better off, with $1150 instead of the present $925. A secondary school

certificated teacher appears to come off much better, since in a

school of the same medium size, 1150, the chances of getting the

allowance are superficially better than one in two (p.66). But note

here that he is competing with the graduate teachers, of whom there

are practically none in the primary schools, and who are likely to be preferred before him for allowances. Now since there are 294,000 (p.23)

pupils in government or aided primary schools, and only 37,000 in similar secondary schools, the vast majority of teachers in these schools (which employ half of all teachers in the Colony), will have their salaries heavily cut, (pp. 62-3), and that in a time of rising living Page 98 of 344

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