1.—13 a.

36

T. H. LABY.

82. In whose hands would you leave the power to decide?— The Professorial Board should know the students and their needs. Subject to the approval of a lay body, the initiation should be in their hands. 83. As between the students of different colleges, how are you going to determine it? Do you suggest that so many should be awarded to each college?—l suggest that each college should be put on its own legs, and that there should be funds adequate to the number of students. 84. Distinct for each college? —Yes. 85. You are opposed to the assessor? —Not opposed, but I believe you cannot obtain suitable assessors in New Zealand. 86. Is that the only reason —because you cannot get the men?— Yes. If you could obtain thoroughly competent men with equal ability to the professors in New Zealand I would be quite willing to have them. 87. Would it be preferable to the other system if the men were obtainable? I am not prepared to say that. One of the advantages of having the four professors would be that they would be brought together. Through the professors not having been brought together the effect has been disastrous. 88. Do you think the system in the Otago University is better, having men acting as assessors? —I understand that is done in the Medical School. 89. You approve of that? —Yes. 90. You referred to the students going away from the country to finish their education? — Yes. There is some information about that which appeared in yesterday's paper. In 1911 there were awarded in Edinburgh seven M.D. degrees and ten M.B. degrees to New Zealand students, making seventeen in all; in New Zealand, twelve M.8.3 and one M.D., making thirteen in all. 91. Are those figures reliable, or is it just a newspaper report?—A newspaper report: it is all the information I have. 92. Do you know what proportipn of those students have taken part of their course at the Otago University? —I have no information. 93. Is it not likely that the greater number of those M.D.s have gone Home to take their postgraduate course ?—Judging from analogy it is desirable that they should go Home. Ido not think it is possible always for us to do the higher work required of an M.D. 94. You referred to the increase in the number of students at Home and the decrease in the number of Australian students there? —Yes. 95. Might that not be due to a considerable extent to the fact that there is a much larger population in the cities of Australia than there is in New Zealand, having regard to the fact that we have just one Medical School in a city of 50,000 or 60,000 people in a country with a total population of a million ? —ln New South Wales there are a million people outside of Sydney. There are 600,000 people in Sydney. You have in New Zealand a million outside of Dunedin. 96. Take Adelaide: what is the population of South Australia? —Four hundred thousand. 97. How many people are there in Adelaide? —About 100,000. [Added later : Population in 1906 was 175,000.] 98. I think there are more. You will see that in proportion to the number of population in the city where the university is situate there is a much greater number in the cities of Australia than in the cities of New Zealand? —There is undoubtedly a larger number in the cities of Australia. 99. Would you not expect that to have an effect upon the proportion of students who go Home?—lt would make the clinical school in Sydney possibly better than the clinical school in Dunedin. 100. But would not the matter of expense be concerned? —Compared with a student living in Goulburn, New South Wales, and a student living at a distance from Dunedin it seems to me about the same. 101. It is not a question of the student going to Sydney, but the very much larger number living in Sydney who do not have to go any distance?—lf that were the case it would imply that a greater number of Australians would go to Edinburgh than actually do. But the Sydney Medical School practically trains all the doctors required for New South Wales. I make that statement on rhe basis of a lecture given by the Dean of Faculty of Medicine in Sydney, in which he pointed out that the Medical School there trained nearly all their own doctors, and they obtained few from abroad. 102. When you compared the expense of carrying on the school in Adelaide, did you take into account the fact that in New Zealand a considerable amount of the expense is incurred in connection with the New Zealand University—l mean that the examination-work, which is conducted by the New Zealand University, is included in the amount of money available in Adelaide? Is not that consideration to be taken into account?— Yes. It works in this way: that because the examining is done in Adelaide the fees that are paid go to the professors. Ihe salary paid to a professor covers his examination-work. That enables higher salaries to be paid there than in New Zealand. Under the present system in New Zealand a large portion of £6,000 goes Home to pay certain Englishmen for going through the examination papers. 103. With regard to the fees : might not the table you have supplied be misleading without further analysis? 1 mean to say, supposing you have a student taking one subject in the North Island and another student taking, say, a full course—it might be at the Medical School: taking the number of subjects, the fees paid by one student might be three or four guineas and by the other thirteen guineas. By lumping the fees together might not the figures be misleading? —I believe the students I mentioned are matriculated students taking their full degree course. The figures would require further analysis.