Professor Henry Beker, chairman and founder of Baltimore Technologies, was due to meet with Michael Wills, the learning and technology minister, early this month. He said the initiative could only proceed with government baking. “Officials wanted to make sure that the disadvantaged would benefit and indicated that research to monitor the consequences of providing large numbers of children with their own laptop or computing device would be required,” Professor Beker explained. The idea is to create a national e-learning foundation and raise funds together with local foundations set up by participating schools.