FREE DISCUSSION

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 March 1941, Page 4

FREE DISCUSSION

MR. F. MILNER’S ATTACK ON BOOK REFERENCE TO “NATONAL EDUCATION.” ATTITUDE OF MAGAZINE EXPLAINED. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, This Day. “Some of you will have noticed in the Press a reference to 'National Education’ by Mr. F. Milner in connection with remarks passed by him about the book, ‘Contemporary New Zealand,’ ” said the Dominion president of the New Zealand Educational Institute', Mr. D. Forsyth, in an address to the Wellington branch last night. “It is only fair to the editor of 'National Education,’ and to- the contributor who wrote the articles after consultation with the editor to point out that the whole text was devoted to an educational subject without any reference to partisan politics. “The quotations to which Mr. Milner took exception referred in the first instance to a matter of national culture, and was, moreover, qualified in 'National Education’ by the remarks which followed. They were: ‘This was written well before the present war, and was not a comment on the naturally Understandable views of most, New Zealanders at the present time.’ But there is a significant phrase used which explains what I mean —energies • • • • “unavailable for the uses of ordinary life.” That is the trouble—our lives lose flavour, richness and even meaning because our energies, thoughts and senses have not been directed to New Zealand.’

“The Educational Institute has always provided space in its journal for free discussion of problems related to educational and cultural matters, and could not possibly permit any form of private censorship to question or distort the view’s expressed. In this instance a controversy has arisen quite outside the scope of anything said in ‘National Education,’ as any . fairminded reader can sec by referring to the current issue.”