RESIGNS IN BODY

Taranaki Daily News, 18 September 1940, Page 6

RESIGNS IN BODY

COMMITTEE IN PROTEST USE OF SCHOOL GROUNDS The Patea school committee has decided to resign as a protest against the action of the Wanganui Education Board in deciding to utilise a portion of the playing area of the school for the site of a new residence, thus curtailing space available for ecreation. It was stated by the chairman, Mr. R. E. Moore,. in an interview yesterday that the school grounds were originally a wilderness when the school committee decided to put them in order. Working bees were organised, a plough, shovels, barrows and other tools were borrowed and the grounds were set out, all work being done voluntarily by the school committee and Patea residents who wished to have the school grounds a site to be proud of. A great deal of hard work was required to make the school grounds what they are to-day. Committee Not Notified. When the decision that a new residence should be built for the schoolmaster was first reached the. Minister of Education, the Hon. P. Fraser, visited Patea and was shown a site in the school grounds chosen by the Wanganui Education Board. The Patea school committee was not notified of the Minister's visit or consulted as to the site for the residence. The committee was unanimously against the playing area being cut up, especially when other property owncd by the education board, and at present leased, in Victoria Street in the vicinity of the school could have been made available for the schoolmaster's residence. Lctter to Headmaster. The Minister of Education recently wrote to the headmaster of the Patea school, Mr. C. P. Bates, notifying him that the Wanganui Education Board had been authorised to commence building the school house immediately, the site of the house to be on what is at present the playing and football ground for the smaller boys. "We were not notified of this by the education board but were given it second hand from Mr. Bates, although we had been doing all the correspondence in connection with the school house," said Mr .Moore. Mr. Moore has been on the Patea school committee for 22 years, for a number of which he has been chairman of the committee. Mr. G. Marshall is secretary and the other members of the committee are Messrs. G. Francis, R. Mays, C. Beauchamp, E. Lash, W. Bond, C. S. Martin and A. Tayler.