ecessarily weaker than
an authority entrusted not merely with the care of a single interest but
with the care of the public interests as a whole. If there is to be
decentralisation of any part of the functions of the central authority,
then any form of decentralisation which consists in the handing over of
particular interests to different local bodies, however it may be for
the advantage of the particular interest is radically bad for the
general interests of the community. The calling into existence of a
number of local authorities each having the care of one particular
interest, each pursuing its own aim independently and without
consideration of the differing and often conflicting aims of the other
bodies, each having the power of rating for its own particular purpose
without any regard for the general interest of the taxpayer, is
radically an unsound form of decentralisation.

2. The establishment of such a form of control fails, and must
necessarily fail, in the local authorities securing the maximum of
freedom and the minimum of interference from the executive officers of
the central legislative authority. So long as the separate interests of
the community are entrusted to different local authorities, so long must
there remain to the central authority and to its executive officers the
power of regulating and harmonising the various and often contending
interests so as to secure that the general interest of the individual
does not suffer, and the more keenly each particular body furthers the
particular interest entrusted to its care the greater is the necessity
for this central control and interference, and that the central control
should be effective.

3. The separation of the so-called educational interests from the other
interests of the community is not for the good of education itself. The
real educational interests which have to be determined by the adult
portion of the community are the exact nature of the services which a
nation such as ours requires of its future members. This determined, the
method of their attainment is best entrusted to the educational expert.
The first-named end will be better realised by a body composed of men of
diverse interests than by one which is made up of men with one intense
but often narrow interest.

4. The larger the powers entrusted to any body and the more freedom
possessed by it in devising and working out its schemes, the better
chance there is of attracting the bes