co-operation. In a number of districts Child Care Committees, sponsored by Senior Inspectors of Schools, have instituted central case registers. These have been a great help in ensuring that visiting teachers and public health nurses do not deal independently with the same child and family.

A residential course at Frederic Wallis House, Lower Hutt, has been planned for visiting teachers and public health nurses in 1956.

(ii) and (iii) Additional Visiting Teachers and Type of Officer to Help in Post-Primary Schools.—Approval has been given for four additional visiting teachers—two in Auckland, one in Wellington, and one in Christchurch. Discussions have been held with representative post-primary-school principals on the kind of help they need with problem children. Rather than have visiting teachers specially attached to the post-primary service, the great majority of principals were strongly in favour of extending the functions of the Education Boards' visiting teachers to cover post-primary pupils, so that one individual could follow the members of a family through their full school career. Approval has therefore been given for this. As a further assistance to both primary and post-primary schools, three additional school psychologists have been appointed.

(iv) Housing for Teachers.—The Department has been trying to deal with this problem in two ways:

(v) Facilities for Recreation.—The use of school grounds and buildings after school hours is entirely in the hands of boards and local committees. The Department has no direct authority in the matter, but does facilitate and encourage such use. Practice varies, but in many schools very great use is made of school facilities for community purposes. The work in this respect will be made more effective by the decision taken at the beginning of 1955 to build halls in all new post-primary and intermediate schools built to the new designs, to re-introduce the £2 for £1 subsidy up to £4,000 for halls in primary schools and to give a pound-for-pound subsidy up to £4,000 on gymnasia in post-primary schools. Approval has just been given, on an experimental basis, for a subsidy on a gymnasium and cafeteria in one intermediate school in Auckland, with the express condition that it be used "to provide recreational and cultural facilities for young people who have left school".

The Committee recommends these opinions for the consideration of the Government.

(f) Research Into Juvenile Delinquency

The Mazengarb Committee was of opinion that there should be a long-term study of the problem of delinquency. As a matter of fact the present Committee heard evidence on this suggestion from several witnesses, and we were greatly impressed by what we heard. It goes without saying that if one would seek a remedy for a given problem a thorough diagnosis of the problem itself is a fundamental prerequisite. First let us find the facts; let us know what is the nature and extent of the evil; let us get as much data as to its causes and incidence. With that material in hand we should be in a better position to search for useful methods of treatment. This task of fact finding would be a long and arduous one; it would need to be entrusted to experts of wide knowledge and experience. A start has already been made by the setting up of the Inter-Departmental Committee referred to earlier in this report. We strongly recommend the Government to give very favourable consideration to this particular proposal, and we hope that ways and means will be found of giving effect to it. We think that this suggestion is of fundamental importance in any approach to the problem, and we consider it should be given consideration by the Government.

Instruction for Parents: In the long run the responsibility for a child's general well-being rests upon the parents. Some can, and do, take every care to discharge that responsibility. Others either fail or neglect to do so. In some cases this failure comes from a lack of the necessary knowledge or from inability to impart it. In one memorandum addressed to the Committee there appear the following paragraphs: