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Scottish Court of Session Decisions
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> Scottish Court of Session Decisions >> School Board of Crieff, Petitioners [1897] ScotLR 34_817 (14 July 1897)
URL: http://www.bailii.org/scot/cases/ScotCS/1897/34SLR0817.html
Cite as: [1897] SLR 34_817, [1897] ScotLR 34_817
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SCOTTISH_SLR_Court_of_Session
Page: 817↓
Court of Session Inner House First Division.
Facts:
The School Board of C, owing to changes made by the Boundary Commissioners, became the natural recipients of a grant made annually out of the funds of a mortification to the School Board of M, and presented a petition, with the approval of the governors of the mortification and the School Board of M, craving the Court to amend the scheme of administration, by substituting their name for that of the School Board of M, as the recipients of the grant, and to reduce the amount payable from £15 to £10 per annum, on the ground that the latter sum would be sufficient for the expense of carrying out the purposes for which the grant was made. The proposed scheme was remitted to a reporter. One of the governors of the mortification lodged a minute craving the Court to consider the question as to whether payment of any part of the grant should be made to the present petitioners, and to remit back to the reporter for that purpose. The Court held that this question was not appropriately raised under the petition, and granted the prayer of the petition.
A petition was presented by the School Board of the parish of Crieff “to amend or alter the present scheme for the administration of the Innerpeffray Mortification, approved by Order of the Privy Council of date 19th August 1889.”
By the clause proposed to be amended the governors of the Innerpeffray Mortification had power to grant the use of the school and teacher's house at Innerpeffray to the Muthill School Board, and to pay the board an annual sum of £15 under the condition of its keeping up the house and school, and maintaining a school there. The Boundary Commissioners having transferred to Crieff from Muthill that part of the parish where Innerpeffray School is situated, the petitioners presented this petition for the purpose of having the administration of the school handed over to them, and both the School Board of Muthill and the governors of the mortification declared their willingness to agree to the transfer.
The petitioners stated that they were willing to restrict the payment to be made to them under the section before mentioned to the sum of £10 per year, which sum had been found sufficient to pay the charges of the school. Accordingly the alteration which they craved the Court to make in the scheme of administration was to substitute their name for that of the School Board of
Page: 818↓
Muthill, and to change the amount payable from £15 to £10. The petition was remitted to Mr Bremner P. Lee, advocate, to report “upon the regularity of the procedure, and upon the proposed alteration of the scheme.”
Mr Lee reported that he had been called upon by one of the governors of the mortification, who objected to the annual payment of £10 to the petitioners, and who desired him to report fully on the question as to whether that payment should to made, but that the petition being merely one for removing an administrative difficulty, he had not considered it his duty to enter into this inquiry.
A minute was presented by the governor in question craving the Court “to remit back the petition to the reporter to report upon the question whether any part of the grant of £15 per annum … should be paid to” the petitioners.
The petitioners opposed the remit, and argued that it was incompetent in this petition to object to the scheme as at present existing.
Lord President—The petition in this application is not by the governors of the Innerpeffray Mortification, but by the School Board of the parish of Crieff. Owing to the change made by the Boundary Commissioners the School Board of the parish of Crieff, instead of the School Board of Muthill, is the natural recipient of the grant from the Innerpeffray Mortification. I say the natural recipient according to the arrangement embodied in the scheme settled in 1889. Now, the petitioners say that they do not require £15 a-year, but that £10 is enough for their needs, and accordingly their present proposal is that we should make the requisite change in the recipient of the grant, and limit the amount to their avowed requirements. Now, the minuter takes the occasion of this change being made to say that he is very much dissatisfied with the scheme, because in his view none of the money should go away from the library. That question may be an appropriate subject for another application to the Court, but what we do to-day, if we affirm the report and grant the application, will not affect the reconsideration of the question whether any of the money should be kept for the school, or whether all of it should be applied to the library. That question does not form the subject of this application, and has not been submitted to the Scotch Education Department, or anything of the kind, and I think we cannot entertain it.
The Court approved of the report, and altered the scheme of administration as craved in the prayer of the petition.
Counsel for Petitioners— Clyde. Agents— Drummond & Reid, S.S.C.
Counsel for the Minuter— Grainger Stewart. Agents— W. & F. Haldane, W. S