Britain: An official handbook > 1959

SOCIAL WELFARE
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and their associated medical schools and teaching hospitals, while the Minister of
Health and the Secretary of State for Scotland, and hospital boards and committees,
are also able to initiate and maintain research within the National Health Service.
The Public Health Laboratory Service, administered by the Medical Research
Council for the Ministry of Health, also undertakes research in addition to its more
routine duties, and this provides an important complement to the work of the
Council.
A valuable contribution to research in particular branches of medicine is made
by private organisations, of which the British Empire Cancer Campaign and the
Nuffield Foundation are the largest. There is close collaboration between the
Medical Research Council and these other organisations to ensure the best alloca¬
tion of their respective resources.
Medical Research Council
The Medical Research Council’s programme of work is carried out both in its
own research establishments and by independent investigators, in the universities
and elsewhere, who receive grants from the Council. The programme includes
fundamental studies of the structure and natural processes of the body; clinical and
laboratory studies of disease; the development and evaluation of special methods
of treatment and also of prophylaxis and diagnosis; and the study of social and
occupational factors affecting health and the efficiency of body and mind.
In planning and carrying out its programme, the Council is assisted by special
advisory committees which it may appoint. One of the more important of these is
the Clinical Research Board, set up in consultation with the Health Departments
to assist the development of clinical research.
The Public Health Laboratory Service
The Public Health Laboratory Service provides a network of bacteriological and
virological laboratories throughout England and Wales to assist in the diagnosis,
prevention and control of epidemic diseases. The largest establishment is the
Central Public Health Laboratory at Colindale, in north-west London, which
includes the National Collection of Type Cultures, the Standards Laboratory for
Serological Reagents, the Food Hygiene Laboratory, and reference laboratories
specialising in the identification of certain infective micro-organisms.
In Scotland and Northern Ireland there is no separate Public Health Laboratory
Service; bacteriological work is mainly done in hospital laboratories.
EDUCATION
There are nearly nine million children and young people in full-time attendance
at schools, universities, training colleges or technical colleges in the United King¬
dom. Over 90 per cent of school children attend publicly provided or aided schools.
The universities are independent, self-governing institutions but are aided from
public funds. Most technical colleges and other centres of further education are
publicly maintained. Many schools and colleges continue to benefit from the endow¬
ments provided by benefactors in past centuries.
The bulk of expenditure on education in the United Kingdom therefore comes
from public funds. It is estimated for 1958-59 that total public expenditure on
education, which is increasing, will be about £805 million. This includes expendi¬
ture on university education. Of public expenditure on education other than in the
universities, at present about 60 per cent comes from taxes and about 40 per cent
from local rates.
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