HC Deb 24 February 1890 vol 341 cc1010-1
MR. LANE

I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether "learners," who have neither pay nor responsibility, are permitted to have access to the Mallow and other telegraph offices in Ireland: is it in accordance with the Rules of the Telegraph Service that such persons should deal with and learn the contents of telegrams passing through these offices in small country towns; can he explain why those learners are sent to relieve the regular staff at other stations; and whether he will consider the desirability of sending duly appointed clerks on this duty?

THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES,) Cambridge University

At Mallow, as at other places throughout the United Kingdom, learners without pay have access to the telegraph office; but it cannot be said that they have no responsibility, as they are all required to make the official declaration before a magistrate. It is obvious that unless persons were allowed to learn the telegraph work it would be impossible for the Department to provide itself with qualified telegraphists. It is both in accordance with the Rules of the Service and with the necessities of the case that such persons should deal with actual telegrams. After the learners become thoroughly competent, and while they are waiting for vacancies on the establishment, they are employed to relieve absent officers at other places. This is economical to the Department, and it is beneficial to the learners, in that it affords them some emolument whilst they are waiting for permanent appointments.

MR. LANE

Arising out of that answer, does the right hon. Gentleman think it desirable that persons should be employed in learning the business in such very small places as Mallow? Is it not more desirable that they should lie stationed in the larger towns?

MR. RAIKES

I will make inquiry, and ascertain how far that suggestion can be acted upon.

MR. LANE

I beg to ask the Postmaster General, with reference to the fact that within the past few years six vacancies (five for males and one for females) have occurred in the Cork Telegraph Office, and that five males and one female clerk have been drafted from country towns and railway stations to fill these vacancies, if he will explain why these vacant positions in Cork, or the ones vacated in the country towns and railway stations, were not given or offered to the "learners," who have been waiting at and performing the duties of substitutes in the Cork Office for four or five years?

MR. RAIKES

Since January, 1886, there have been nine vacancies for male telegraphists at Cork, of which four have been filled by learners in that office and five by telegraphists from other offices. Of the five vacancies thus created at other offices, one, at Limerick Junction, was offered to a learner at Cork, who declined it; a second was not filled at all, the situation being abolished; and of the other throe two were filled by learners in the respective offices in which the vacancies occurred. For female telegraphists eight vacancies have occurred at Cork since April, 1884, and of these seven have been filled by learners in the Cork office, and the eighth by a telegraphist from Knocklong Railway Station, the vacancy there being given to a learner from Cork.

MR. LANE

Was there no learner in the Cork Office capable of filling either of these vacancies, so that it was necessary to introduce strangers from other offices?

MR. RAIKES

I have no reason to believe that the persons referred to were unfitted; but the individuals selected were thought to be more competent.